Tornado Research Act of 2004 - Directs the Secretary of Commerce to establish a tornado research program within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, to be carried out in coordination with the National Weather Service, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Science Foundation, and any other appropriate Federal agencies.
Requires that the program: (1) include research aimed at understanding and predicting the natural processes that lead to the formation of tornadoes; (2) identify an array of factors that indicate tornado formation; (3) promote the incorporation of the results of such research into the methods used by meteorologists to predict the time and location of tornado formation; (4) provide resources and promote attention to tornado research areas with the greatest potential for improving the understanding of their formation; (5) maximize the effectiveness of the program by encouraging collaborative efforts by operational and research communities in academia and the Government; and (6) provide for the awarding of competitive research grants to, and the entering into of cooperative agreements with, institutions of higher education and other research institutions to conduct peer-reviewed research that may improve the forecast and identification of tornadoes.