by DianeD

Created on: March 06, 2009

Severe weather can be an exciting time for meteorologists and storm chasers, but to ordinary citizens, the damage from hail, lightning, high wind speeds, tornadoes, and the hurricanes that can result from these storms can be extremely costly and deadly.

Super storms occur when Northern cool air masses move south meeting warm air masses. A southwestern storm may also move northeast intersecting with the northern cool air and southern warm air. As these air masses intersect, wind speeds can increase frequently causing straight line winds. If the wind speed exceeds 58 miles per hour, the storm is considered to be severe. The NWS, National Weather Service, will then announce that a thunderstorm threat in imminent. These high winds speeds are generally accompanied by heavy rain, lightning, and sometimes hail.

If the intersected masses of air begin to move in a circular motion, the formation of a funnel cloud, or tornado, can result. If a funnel cloud is not actually seen during a storm, but excessive damage has occurred, meteorologists will study the direction of the debris before releasing information stating that the storm was tornado or straight line winds associated with a storm. If trees are bent and debris has been moved in only one direction, the culprit is generally straight line winds; on the other hand, if debris is distributed in all directions, a reasonable assumption is that a tornado has passed through the area.

Tornadoes have formed all over the world, but Tornado Alley, Texas, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Nebraska, in the United States is especially vulnerable to these storms in the spring and fall. These states have suffered up to 500 tornadoes in one storm season, ranging from F-1 to F-5 in strength. The size of a tornado is measured by the damage done by the funnel cloud. Tornadoes with a wind speed of 150 mph are likely to do more damage by picking up and relocating more debris than a tornado with an 70 mph wind speed; thus, categorizing the tornado according to the Fajita scale. When a thunderstorm is approaching an area, meteorologists will report the impending conditions indicated by Doppler radar and broadcast the appropriate information and warnings. A tornado watch indicates that there is a possibility of a tornado forming from a thunderstorm. A tornado warning will be announced when a tornado has actually been spotted on the ground or radar highly suggests that a tornado is likely to occur.

Hurricanes can also form out of super storms over the ocean;

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