Скачать или смотреть What Is A Hurricane? | Hurricane Facts For Kids Video

A hurricane is an intense tropical storm with powerful winds and heavy rain and can also create tornadoes, high waves and lots of flooding.

Hurricanes form over warm ocean waters near the equator. The warm, moist air above the ocean surface rises, causing air from surrounding areas to be “sucked” in. This “new” air then becomes warm and moist, and rises, too, beginning a continuous cycle that forms clouds. The clouds then rotate with the spin of the Earth. If there is enough warm water to feed the storm, a hurricane forms!

At the center of the hurricane is the eye. The eye is an area of very low air pressure. There are generally no clouds in the eye and the wind is calm. Don't let this fool you, however, the most dangerous part of the storm is at the edge of the eye called the eye wall.
Eye wall - Around the outside of the eye is a wall made up of very heavy clouds. This is the most dangerous part of the hurricane and where the highest speed winds are. The winds at the eye wall can reach speeds of 155 miles per hour.

What is the most devasting element of a hurricane; Storm surges. As a hurricane’s winds spiral around and around the storm, they push water into a mound at the storm’s center. This mound of water becomes dangerous when the storm reaches land because it causes flooding along the coast. The water piles up, unable to escape anywhere but on land as the storm carries it landward. A hurricane will cause more storm surge in areas where the ocean floor slopes gradually. This causes major flooding.


Hurricanes range from about 100 miles (160 kilometers) to 1000 miles (1600 kilometers) wide. They can last from days to weeks and almost always form over the ocean. They can have speeds over 200 miles per hour (322 kilometers per hour), with things flying all over and also have heavy rains with them, which can cause land/mud slides.

The closer a hurricane gets to the shore, the weaker it gets. In fact, some hurricanes get so weak and so much smaller by the time they get to land that they aren’t even hurricanes anymore. They are what weather experts call tropical storms or tropical depressions.

When does hurricane season start?
The Atlantic hurricane season is from June 1 to November 30, but most hurricanes occur during the fall months. The Eastern Pacific hurricane season is from May 15 to November 30.

Hurricanes are also called cyclones and typhoons, depending on where they occur. In the Atlantic Ocean and Northwest Pacific they are hurricanes, in the Northwest Pacific they are typhoons and in the South Pacific and Indian Ocean they are cyclones.

The largest hurricane on record is Typhoon Tip, which occurred in 1979 in the northwest Pacific. With a diameter of around 2,220km, it was nearly half the size of the United States!

Hurricane Categories
Category 1 hurricanes have wind speeds of 74 to 95 miles per hour and cause small damage.
Category 2 hurricanes have wind speeds of 96 to 110 miles per hour and cause moderate damage.
Category 3 hurricanes cause damage to roofs and trees and have wind speeds of 111 to 130 miles per hour.
Category 4 hurricanes are likely to cause some deaths and extreme damage to buildings and trees. They have wind speeds of 131 to 155 miles per hour.
Category 5 hurricanes cause death and dreadful damage. They have wind speeds of over 155 miles an hour. The result of a category 5 hurricane is often a disaster.
The names of hurricanes
Meteorologists (scientists who study weather) know when tropical storms are about to happen. The meteorologists give names to all the tropical storms, hurricanes, typhoons and cyclones.
Has your name ever been used for a tropical storm or hurricane? If so let us know in the comments below
The first storm of the year begins with the letter ‘A’.
The names are male and female in order. The names are reused every six years.
If a storm causes terrible destruction and loss of life, the name is not used again.

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