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Animation:
cold and
warm fronts Another
animation
Land & Sea Breezes
• Unequal heating of air over land and water
results in breezes near shorelines.
• While the land is warm during the day, air
above it rises, and a cool breeze blows in
from the sea.
• As the land cools off at night, air pressure
over it increases, and a cool land breeze
blows out to the sea.
• Examine the changing temperature of the
land throughout the 24 hours represented in
the animation.
• Animation
Global Wind Belts
• The distance wind travels varies.
• Global winds travel thousands of kilometers in steady
patterns.
• Formed by two main factors:
– unequal heating of the earth by sunlight
– the earth's spin.
• The unequal heating makes the tropical regions warmer
than the polar regions. As a result, there is generally
higher pressure at the poles and lower at the equator.
Wind flows from high to low pressure.
• So the atmosphere tries to send the cold air toward the
equator at the surface and send warm air northward
toward the pole at higher levels.
• The spin of the earth prevents this from being a direct
route, and the flow in the atmosphere breaks into three
zones between the equator and each pole.
Global Wind Belts
• A series of
wind belts
circles Earth.
Between the
wind belts
are calm
areas where
air is rising
or falling.
Bands of calm air separate
global wind belts
• The earth’s rotation and the uneven heating of its
surface cause a pattern of wind belts separated by
calm regions.
• Calm Regions
– Air usually stays calm; winds are light
– Doldrums
– Horse Latitudes
• Wind Belts
– Curve to the east or west because of Coriolis Effect.
– Coriolis Effect: if the earth did not rotate, the wind would
flow directly from the poles to the equator. The earth’s
rotation changes the direction of wind and they curve to the
east or west.
– Name after the direction from which they blow
– Trade winds
– Westerlies
– Easterlies
Coriolis Effect
• As Earth
rotates, the
Coriolis effect
turns winds in
the Northern
Hemisphere
toward the
right.
Animation
Another animation
Wind Belts
• 6 total: 3 in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) & 3 in the
Southern (SH).
• The Trade winds: Blow from the east moving from the
horse latitudes toward the equator. The strong,
steady winds die out as they come near the equator.
• The Prevailing Westerlies: blow from the west,
moving from the horse latitudes toward the equator.
They bring storms across much of the US. Most of
North America fits into this belt and that is why our
weather usually comes from west.
• The Polar Easterlies: which blow from the east,
moving from the polar regions toward the middle
latitudes. Stormy weather often occurs when the cold
air of the easterlies meets the warmer air of the
westerlies.
Calm Regions
• Doldrums: Low-pressure zone near the equator.
– Warm air rises to the top of the troposphere
– Since much of the air movement is vertical, winds are light.
– The air and then spreads out toward the poles.
– The rising, moist air produces clouds and heavy rain.
– During the hottest months, heavy evaporation from warm ocean
water in the region fuels tropical storms.
– Sailors noticed the stillness of the rising (and not blowing) air near
the equator and gave the region the depressing name "doldrums."
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Conversion Table
Angle (Degrees) Wind Speed (Approximate) (km/h)
90 0
85 6
80 8
75 10
70 12
65 13
60 15
55 16
50 18
45 20
40 21
35 23
30 26
25 29
20 33