Tornado Research Papers

Overview

I chose to research tornadoes because they are quite common where I live. Tornadoes are a destructive force of nature with wind speeds up to 300 miles per hour. The origin of the word tornado is the Spanish word for thunderstorm, tronada. Tornadoes are a type of small cyclone that occur when different air masses collide, creating a whirlwind around a low-pressure system. Most tornadoes occur in the Northern Hemisphere, mainly the United States. The central part of the United States is called Tornado Alley because this is where most tornadoes occur. My family resides in an area that is home to many tornadoes, many of which are quite severe. This is the reason, tornadoes were of interest to research.

Causes

Tornadoes are generated

Generally, a warm, moist air mass meets a cold front, with winds moving in opposite directions. Cumuliform clouds build due to moisture condensing and rising air due to updrafts forming a thunderstorm. As the cloud builds vertically, the moisture at the top of the cloud freezes and the precipitation drops are not supported by the updraft. The precipitation starts the down draft. With both updrafts and down drafts, a mature thunderstorm is formed. Strong down drafts cause increasing wind speeds and gust fronts. If weather conditions, such as temperature and moisture, are adequate a supercell is formed. Different speeds and directions of wind cause air to initially rotate horizontally. As the updraft strengthens, this horizontally rotating air feeds into the updraft causing it to move and rotate vertically. If rotation occurs in the updraft a mesocyclone, or rotating column is formed which lowers into a wall cloud. This wall cloud is formed in the supercell’s updraft. As the air feeds in, a vortex, or tornado, is formed as the rotation reaches from the cloud to the ground. This rotating column of air acts like a vacuum drawing in air, dirt, and debris. At this point, the tornado causes the most damage, injury, and death. Depending on their strength and location tornadoes can uproot trees or destroy homes and buildings due to the high-speed winds

Approximately 1200 tornadoes occur each year in the U.S. alone. With the central United States has the highest tornado frequency by region. Almost one-half of the U.S. annual tornadoes occur in Tornado Alley. There are 65.4 tornadoes on average annually in Oklahoma, which is in the heart of Tornado Alley. Tornado frequency decreases with increasing distance from Tornado Alley. Due to the weather conditions necessary to form a tornado, they are more frequent during late spring and early summer, but can occur in any month of the year. Tornadoes most often occur in the late afternoon to early evening, between 3:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m., but are not limited to any certain