Tornadoes in Hurricanes

While hurricane season has seemed to be on pause for the past few days I was asked by a reader, Bradley, why do tornadoes form in hurricanes? In the research of this topic it opened up a whole can of worms that was too much for a few small lines and needed a full article about it.

When a hurricane makes landfall it completely changes the atmosphere on land into a swampy, soupy mess of hot, moist air – bread and butter for any storm. With such large amounts of this perfect ratio, almost any weak storm could be supercharged into a swirling mass of clouds ready to spawn a tornado. Above that, you have the frigid upper atmosphere, churinging the tops of clouds into ready for the spark from the supercharged clouds from below. Storms can use just the hot air on its own to create a strong storm, but it would fall apart quickly without the stabilization from the cold air. This is where the last piece of our engine comes into play to set it off, shear, which is the meteorological term used to call the change of wind speed and direction in the vertical plane of the atmosphere. If you have ever been on a flight with turbulence it was most likely caused by shear. This is the metaphorical spark plug between the hot and cold air as this starts the mixing of atmosphere and causes tornadoes in general. But with hurricanes, this shear is either caused by the normal mixing of the atmosphere or by the intense inner parts of the storm running along the ground and being forced up by the land creating a sort of artificial shear. Now these tornadoes are the most likely to occur on the front side of the eye, and more specifically, the front right quadrant as that is the hurricanes strongest side, but that’s another article.

On another note I am now back at college and need your suggestions or questions more than ever to keep making these articles. You can contact the paper and I will get those messages forwarded to me or you can contact me directly with this email address tomy3290@gmail.com. Any topics are greatly appreciated as the semester is in full swing. Now onto your local weather.

As we head into October at the end of this week you should have noticed the cold front that came in yesterday and brought us to our regularly scheduled fall temps. With the rest of the week we can expect temps around the mid 80’s with 10 to 15 mph winds as the front continues to push through with a second front coming Friday night to put us in the upper 70’s for the weekend. On the astronomical side of things we will have a full moon on Thursday night to bring in October.