Tornado Facts
It’s interesting to learn and read about tornado facts. Known to some as the twister or the cyclone, the tornado, as what it is popularly known today is a strong and violent rotating column of air, connected to the surface of the earth and a type of cloud known as a cumulonimbus cloud or in rare cases to a cumulus type of cloud.
The wind speed of a tornado varies from 40 mph to 110 mph, with a size of 250 feet in diameter. It can travel for a few kilometers before disappearing as fast as it started. Most tornadoes occur in the United States and rare occurrences do take place around the world. Tornadoes come in various sizes but the usual form is of a visible condensation funnel whose narrow tip touches the earth. The tip is often seen with debris around it.
To get more into the matter at hand, we should look more with an in depth perspective of the basic tornado facts. A tornado is considered to be the vortex of the wind. The vortex is classified as a tornado if it touches the cloud and the ground.
In some occasions, a single storm produces different tornadoes simultaneously or one after the other. These tornadoes produced by the same storm are called a tornado family.
There are 4 types of true tornadoes, meaning they are structured and occur as tornadoes and not just appear like one.
- The first type is the multiple vortex tornado, where two or more columns rotate around a common point of origin. This type of tornado usually occurs in very strong tornadoes.
- The next type is the satellite tornado, which occurs near the larger tornado and orbits around it.
- The next type is a waterspout tornado. There are two types of this category. One is the fair weather waterspouts and the other one is the tornadic waterspout. The fair weather waterspouts are mild and common. They appear in tropical or semitropical places. They hover over water and are linked to cumulus congestus clouds. Tornadic waterspouts on the other hand are the more severe tornadoes on water. They are either land tornadoes that reached the water or formed by thunderstorms. As compared with the fair weather waterspout, the tornadic waterspouts are faster, making it more intense and dangerous.
- The last type is the landspout. This type of tornado is the counterpart of the fair weather waterspout but this time on land. They basically have the same characteristics and intensity.
Tornadoes differ in size and color. The color of a tornado is affected by the environment it is in and the noise is like a low rumbling sound. Today, there are a lot of means and ways to track and predict a tornado through weather forecasts and radar systems. The best thing to do after a tornado warning has been announced is to hide under the basement, an underground refuge, a sturdy shelter or a ditch when on an open road. These tornado facts can save lives if taken into account. You should know that with a tornado, we’re dealing with more than just a gust of wind.