"I consider my time spent with Ted the personal highlight of my professional career. I started at the University of Chicago unsure of my abilities to succeed. I left with a wealth of knowledge and confidence that I could successfully embark on a teaching and research career. Fujita was a demanding advisor, but his enthusiasm, deep insights, and ability to conceptualize mesoscale processes were truly inspiring. Ted loved to argue with other researchers when there was pushback for his suction vortex model, the existence of microbursts, and the accuracy of his windspeed estimates based on the F-scale. Debates on these topics seem to energize him, and he often said that time would prove that his theories were correct. I was always in awe that his seminars and other public events would be literally packed to the rafters. He was a brilliant speaker and one of the greatest spokespersons for our community. I often think that today's TED talks were appropriately named after him."