Cyclone vs. Hurricane vs. Tornado -How are these storms different?
Did you know that a cyclone and a hurricane are the same type of storm, with different names. In the Western Pacific, they are also called typhoons, and around Australia they are known as willy-willys.
What about tornadoes?
In terms of overall size, a tornado is much smaller storm system which meteorologists suspect evolve from the rotation of clouds associated with severe thunderstorms. While a hurricane can attain a diameter of 300 to 500-miles, a tornado is generally less than a mile in diameter. However, while the peak wind gust in a hurricane can reach perhaps 200 miles per hour (in the most extreme case), the most extreme tornado winds have been estimated to reach to over 300 miles per hour!
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Interesting. But what fuels a tornado and what causes it to lose its strength?
Good question.
A tornado is “fueled” by the clash of contrasting air masses: warm, moist air interacting with cool, dry air. Such clashes produce thunderstorms that can be severe and could lead to rotation that can ultimately spawn a tornado.
The tornadic winds will tend to diminish when there is no longer any significant contrast; usually when there is more cool/dry air infiltrating the thunderstorm and the warm/humid air is for lack of a better term, overwhelmed. With not much contrast, the storm’s strength ebbs and eventually it dies.
So what distinguishes a hurricane from a cyclone or typhoon? These are the same type of storm, OK, but they are different from each other, yes? Not just different words for the same thing?
They are exactly the same type of storm . . . just different names. They form the same way . . . they reach maturity the same way . . . and when they move over land or into cooler waters, they die the same way.
In regaurds to amh’s question, isn’t it true that cyclones south of the equator rotate counterclockwise and north of the equator rotate clockwise? You indicated the storms are exactly the same.
Yes . . . that is indeed true. When I stated that they are exactly the same I meant the same type of storm. But all pressure systems (HIGHs and LOWs) have circulations that rotate in the opposite directions south of the equator, compared to their northern hemisphere counterparts.
when a tropical storm crosses the equator, will it change rotational direction from clockwise to counterclockwise, or vice-versa. i’ve always wondered that.