Japanese-born American meteorologist

In 1974, Theodore Fujita became the first scientist to identify microburst wind shear, a particularly intense and isolated form of wind shear later blamed for several devastating airline accidents in the 1980s. The development of Doppler radar allowed Fujita to track and explain the microburst phenomenon, which is now far better understood and avoided by aviators. Fujita also lent his name to the "F Scale" he developed to measure the strength of tornadoes by analyzing the damage they cause on the ground.

Fujita was born in Kitakyushu City, Japan, to Tomojiro, a schoolteacher, and Yoshie (Kanesue) Fujita. Fujita showed an early aptitude for science and obtained the equivalent of a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the Meji College of Technology in 1943. It was while he was working as an assistant professor of physics at Meji that U.S. forces...