Photographer captures tornado while hunting lightning

Photographer Tracy Kerestesh, 53, captured the tornado and storm that caused damage near Melville on Sunday. Now, her photos have gone viral.

"This is crazy. I never expected this," she said.

As of Monday morning, she had more than 6,500 shares.

I could see the fingers over my house.- Tracy Kerestesh

"I had a hoot yesterday," she said. However, Kerestesh almost missed the storm entirely.

She was exhausted after shooting an all day wedding on Saturday, so she went down for a nap.

"I thought 'I don't want to see a camera at least three days.'"

Then, her storm chasing mentor Sean Schofer texted her and said the storm was moving over Melville.

"I thought oh crap — it is," she said. "I could see the fingers over my house. They come down in fingers and you start to get that kind of spaceship front."

She said she could see the loose clouds underneath the system rapidly being sucked up. 

Kerestesh took out her Canon Mark 3 DSLR camera and wide angle fish eye lens with the intention of shooting lightning.

She was on Highway 9 going north, so she went east, and stayed ahead of it.

"That's when I turned around and got the picture," she said.

 It all happened so fast she didn't have time to switch her gear.

"I was doing the lightning and I went 'holy crap' that's coming right at me," she said.

"I was trying to get the whole sky, so I actually made the tornado smaller and farther away."

Courage to chase

Kerestesh said she wasn't that scared.

"I'm kind of a bit of an adrenaline junkie."

In April, the grandmother went scuba diving with sharks in the Bahamas. She said she treads carefully on the line between adrenaline and fear.

Kerestesh is actually a wedding photographer, but turned to scenery, and that turned into the storm chasing.

She photographs auroras and rainbows to celebrate life, one life in particular.

"My life is just an honour to his," she said of her late grandson, Lucian Williamson.  

He was diagnosed with leukaemia at six months old and succumbed to the illness at the age of two.

"That's where the courage comes from, because it's him."

She views storms the way she views life.

"It's kind of scary and beautiful all at the same time."

• 2 tornadoes confirmed in Saskatchewan Sunday

Kerestesh has photographed portraits for the past three decades, and she chased her first storm in 2012.

She joked and said wedding parties are often scarier than any storm she's seen.