"TYPHOON!" The word causes terror in the hearts of Chinese, Japanese, Filipinos, Gamma and Micronesians. It is a word of Chinese origin used west of the 180th meridian to describe a storm that can reach winds of 120 km / h or more. East of the imaginary north-south divide, these storms are called hurricanes.
Dozens of these howling eruptions cross the Pacific and Indian Oceans each year. Typhoons sometimes strike China, causing great destruction of life and property. Japan is sometimes hit by two typhoons at the same time, with floods and landslides claiming many lives.
Large amounts of energy are released during a typhoon or hurricane. It is estimated,that a mature hurricane can export more than 3,500,000,000 tonnes of air per hour.
How do these huge storms start? What does it feel like to live on it? Can they be spotted early enough that people escape their destructive anger?
ITCZ
Have you ever heard of the "intertropical convergence zone"? Also known by the early letters ITCZ, it is a belt of converging trade winds and rising air that envelops the land near the equator. This area is the center of tropical storms because the heat from the sun heats the air and water more than any other area on earth. What purpose?
Water from the surface of the sea continuously evaporates and rises with the warm air to form clouds. If the conditions are favorable, several hot air inlets can be combined, creating a chimney effect. As the chimney grows, it begins to spin due to the rotation of the earth. The air pressure at the bottom of the chimney drops rapidly, drawing even more air and moisture out of the spinner. The same is true when water is sucked up through the bottom of a straw. Warm, humid air can reach heights of thirty to thirty-five thousand feet and find there a layer of cold air. This is how it spreads; The moisture condenses and begins to fall like rain, turning faster and faster with the wind as the storm develops.
The water in the "eye" of this storm may be ten to fifteen meters higher than the surrounding sea. A strong typhoon or hurricane can smash ocean waves at heights of between 50 and 100 meters. Can you imagine the destructive power of such a big bellows? The wrath of typhoon winds or the force of hurricanes are known to smash small trees, carry large ships ashore and have trains.
Discover the birth of a storm
Due to poor communication abilities, a barometer dropped rapidly over the years, indicating a rapid drop in air pressure on warnings people would receive. But it was often too late to escape the fury of a storm. Later, with the broadcast of radio communications, volunteer observers on the desert networks were able to warn a few hours in advance that a storm was approaching.
Then came radar with its ability to detect helical cloud formation from a typhoon. However, because radar signals travel in a straight line along the curves of the Earth, radar detection of the typhoon is only possible when the storm hits about two hundred miles from a radar instrument.
Weather satellites are by far the most useful way to spot typhoons. One of them circles the Earth in a north-south direction and sweeps an area of 2,000 by 2,000 miles every four and a half minutes. What the satellite "sees" is recorded on magnetic tape for playback at two control stations in the United States, one in Fairbanks, Alaska, and the other in Wallops Island, Virginia.
By installing this satellite, weather stations in Guam, Wake Island, Honolulu and many other places can know the weather conditions for hundreds of kilometers around it. Forecasting offices in Honolulu and Guam evaluate incoming cloud images and look for cloud patterns typical of a tropical storm or typhoon.
Another weather satellite has the orbital speed set to stay in a fixed position at the equatorial point of a Pacific Ocean. This allows weather stations to photograph most of the Pacific every twenty-two minutes. A similar satellite is serving in the Atlantic.
When a typhoon is imminent
What happens if a typhoon pattern appears on a weather satellite image? At that time, the weather stations in the region will be warned. Measures are taken to preserve life and minimize property damage. But that's not all.Weather stations send large balloons into the air with transmitters. Special receivers track these instruments, which provide information on temperature, humidity, wind speed and storm direction of the storm at an altitude of about seventeen miles. In addition, special typhoon hunters are sent from Guam or the Philippines to monitor an ongoing storm and transmit wind speed information via radio to various locations, from the edge of the storm to its center under sea conditions.
Detecting and tracking typhoons from the moment they are born is extremely important. For example, coral atoll-like islands that are home to many Micronesians are particularly prone to storms, as these islands are on average no more than 20 meters above sea level. Ships at sea also enjoy storm surges. Storm warnings that provide enough time to avoid damage.
In fact, great strides have been made in spreading early warnings about violent typhoons or hurricanes. Unfortunately, if these warnings are ignored, many people will die. Given the destructive forces that these tropical storms unleash, it is wise to flee as quickly as possible.
Following the measure is always important