Kory Hartman is SevereStudios' CEO, video broker, and senior Severe Weather Specialist.

Kory started his broadcast career at his hometown radio station in Iron River, Michigan. There's not much severe weather in the Upper Peninsula, but Kory spent summers on a farm near Garretson, South Dakota. While visiting the northern portions of Tornado Alley, Kory quickly became fascinated by severe storms and tornadoes and the media's coverage of outbreaks.

Kory moved to South Dakota in 1997, and worked for a couple years at a radio station in Madison, SD. Kory was on the air giving weather reports on May 30, 1998, the night of the massive F4 Spencer, SD tornado which wiped most of the town off the map. Kory later requested a tape from Bill Reid, a storm chaser that was in the area. When the tape arrived in his mailbox, it included a documented storm "chase" all the way from Nebraska to the Spencer area. On the tape, the chasers were listening to Kory read warnings on the radio!

To see the devastation caused by a violent tornado, Kory joined up with the volunteer cleanup effort in Spencer, and broadcast live from the scene. It was an experience he will never forget. Kory immediately knew he needed to learn how to spot and chase storms, to help protect the public, and attended his first NWS spotter training course the following spring. He made severe weather coverage the number one priority at every radio station for which he worked.

In 2004, Kory became one of the first storm chasers to broadcast live video back to a local TV station. Once the technology was perfected, Kory helped form SevereStudios.com in 2007 and began streaming live tornado video for free to a mass audience via the Internet.

On a storm chase June 11, 2008, Kory was hit by the Little Sioux, IA tornado. While trying to get away from a dangerous situation, Kory made a wrong turn and drove directly into the path of a rain-wrapped tornado. During the event, Kory's dash cam streamed the encounter live to WOWT-TV in Omaha, NE, thus Kory also became the first person in history to stream live video from inside a tornado.

Kory has worked in the media industry for 17 years and is the weekend forecaster and storm chaser for KSFY-TV in Sioux Falls, SD. Kory also consults radio stations with programming, technical issues, and severe weather training.

Kory is married to a very understanding wife, and has two sons, ages 7 and 4.