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What is a cyclonic pump?

2019-10-17T01:20:25.218Z


Cyclonic bomb is a term given to a storm that quickly strengthens and meets an important criterion.


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(CNN) - Bomb. It's not a word you can say on a plane (remember Ben Stiller in Meet the Parents ?). You should also be careful when using it to describe a storm system.

You hear the phrase "cyclone bomb" appearing occasionally in the stories of the weather. This is what it means:

What makes a storm a cyclone bomb?

• Cyclone bomb is a term given to a storm that is rapidly strengthening and fulfills an important criterion.
• Generally, the pressure should drop 24 millibars (a unit of pressure) in a 24-hour period .
• However, that benchmark is also based on the latitude of the storm . Then, the requirement of millibars may change depending on where the storm forms.

But why is it called that?

The term cyclone bomb dates back to a meteorological research article published in an 1980 edition of the Monthly Weather Review .

Its authors, MIT meteorologists Fred Sanders and John Gyakum, relied on the work of Swedish meteorology researcher Tor Bergeron, who initially defined “rapid deepening” storms as those that met the criteria of 24 millibars in 24 hours.

But Bergeron was in Scandinavia, where storms get stronger much faster due to latitude (remember the Coriolis effect?).

Sanders and Gyakum adjusted the basic rules to vary according to latitude. And they added the term "bomb" due to the explosive power that these storms derive from rapid pressure drops (although, according to reports, Gyakum no longer uses that word due to its reference to armament).

How do you adjust the rules?

As you have read so far, we feel compelled to give you the real equation (and if you love it, maybe you should consider doing a career in meteorology!).

To calculate the pressure drop required for a cyclone pump, take the sine of the latitude where the low pressure is located and divide it by 60 degrees (and you thought you would never use trigonometry ...).

Why 60 degrees? That is the latitude where Bergeron was when he developed the initial scale.

Once you do the calculation, multiply that result by 24, and that is the number of millibars that the storm pressure must lower to officially qualify it as a cyclone bomb at the given latitude.

cyclone pump

Source: cnnespanol

All news articles on 2019-10-17

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