A MAN has turned his hobby into a second job – selling tours chasing tornadoes and extreme weather.

Paul Sherman, 38, from Leigh, was bought a specialist trip to the USA by his wife Louise for his 30th birthday.

Since then, he has never looked back.

Now he has clocked up 125,000 miles and seen 43 tornadoes while pursuing storms through 18 US states, totalling 250 chase days.

The father-of-three, also a jeweller with two shops in London, said: “I said it was something I would love to do.

“I went out there and saw storms, but no tornadoes.

“There were about five or six US companies that offered the trips, but they didn’t get English banter and I didn’t really get theirs.

“I thought I could do the tours better myself.”

Mr Sherman is the only UK operator which offers storm chasing tours. He will fly out to Dallas for his next one on April 28.

He is over in America for ten weeks and weatherman Michael Fish will be on the next outing.

Tours are booked on weather website www.netweather.tv, which the TV weatherman writes forecasts for.

He previously went on a storm chase in 2008 with Mr Sherman, but failed to find any tornadoes.

Mr Sherman said he drives jeeps around America, after using tracking weather devices to try to determine where a tornado will occur.

His tours tend to view tornadoes from about one mile away, which he says is a safe distance, although five miles can give a better view of the overall tornado and its impact.

Mr Sherman said: “In 2008, I did a programme for ITV and we didn’t have any guests with us.

“That was probably the most dangerous one I’ve been involved in as we pushed it to the limit. We were hit by gusts of wind up to 135mph. It gave us some great footage and was incredible.”

Mr Sherman said winds can even get above 250mph, which can sometimes kill.

However, Mr Sherman said he did not think he would tire of his job.

He said: “It can be jaw dropping at times. Every chase is different and so is every tornado.”

Mr Sherman is running four tours this season, from April to June.