Most people arrive at the Dominator through the Discovery Channel, where meteorologist Reed Timmer drove an armored SUV into tornadoes on Storm Chasers. What is less widely known is that the Dominator is not one vehicle but a series, that the series has run for close to twenty years, and that the numbering skips. Here is the whole fleet, in order.
What is the Dominator?
The Dominator, formally the Storm Research Vehicle, is a series of tornado interceptors owned and operated by Reed Timmer, with funding at various points from AccuWeather and the Discovery Channel. The purpose is to drive into the circulation of a tornado and hold position there, taking measurements and video from inside a vortex rather than from a safe distance. That mission drives every design decision in the series: the vehicles get progressively heavier, lower, and better anchored, because the problem being solved is not speed but staying on the ground.
What was the Dominator 1?
The first Dominator was built between 2008 and 2009 on the chassis of a 2007 Chevrolet Tahoe. It was a prototype in the honest sense: bulletproof sheet metal over the body, transparent Lexan panels in place of glass, an external roll cage, and racing harnesses on the assumption that a roll was a realistic outcome rather than a remote one. It had no way of anchoring itself to the ground. That single limitation defined what it could safely intercept, and it is the reason the second vehicle exists.
What was the Dominator 2?
In early 2011, Timmer and other members of TVN bought a 2011 GMC Yukon XL as the base for a second vehicle. The changes over Dominator 1 were substantial rather than cosmetic: a flex fuel engine, a fully sealed outer shell for cleaner airflow, a higher ride height, a wider wheelbase, improved hydraulics, swiveling rear passenger seats so the crew could work facing outward, upgraded armor, and, critically, anchoring spikes. The spikes are the difference. They let Dominator 2 take on tornadoes that would have rolled Dominator 1.
What is the Dominator 3?
The Dominator 3 abandoned the SUV format entirely. It began as a stock 2012 Ford F-350 Super Duty Crew Cab, converted during 2013, and kept a close to stock 6.7-liter turbodiesel producing around 400 horsepower through a six-speed automatic. Almost nothing else survived. It is armored to withstand roughly 200 mph. Published weights disagree: The Drive gives 11,000 pounds and Wikipedia gives 13,000, and we have not found a figure from Timmer himself to settle it. The suspension was replaced with an airbag setup that drops the whole vehicle and its armor onto the ground, a deployable wind skirt seals the undercarriage so air cannot get beneath it and lift it, and spikes drive into the ground to hold it there. Driving, the skirt is raised slightly so it does not snag.
We have a separate piece on how the Dominator 3 deploys and what the 3.2 rebuild changed.
Is there a Dominator 4?
Not as an armored vehicle, no. What exists is the Dominator Fore, a pun rather than a number, which has been the name of three different Subaru Foresters, model years 2018, 2016 and 2015. Timmer has referred to the 2015 car as the Dominator 4.5, which is where most of the confusion starts. There is also a Dominator Ford, a 2025 Ford F-150 acquired in December 2025.
None of these is an interceptor. Wikipedia puts it plainly: the Dominator Fore is a stock vehicle, unlike Timmer’s other storm-chasing vehicles, which are heavily fortified trucks. They are ordinary chase cars carrying the branding, doing the driving that makes up almost all of a chase season. The 2015 Forester was written off in November 2025 after Timmer hit a deer.
What is the Dominator 5?
In July 2024, Timmer announced that a Dominator 5 would be built, with Jake's Custom Diesel of Norman, Oklahoma leading the work. No completion date has been given and the vehicle is not in service. Anything you read specifying its weight, armor or engine is speculation, because those figures have not been published.
What happened to the Dominator 3?
It is still the working vehicle. In June 2025 the Dominator 3 hit a deer on the way back to Oklahoma and the hood was caved in. Timmer announced the completed rebuild on 13 February 2026, designated Dominator 3.2: the hood was rebuilt by Lewis Fabrication of Perkins, Oklahoma with additional steel bars in a triangle fractal pattern, the front end was redesigned, and a new lighting system was fitted. That cause is worth sitting with. A vehicle built to survive 200 mph winds spends most of its life on ordinary roads, and the damage it actually accumulates is mundane.