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Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog
About Kevin
Kevin Myatt grew up in Arkansas to the tune of tornado sirens and the rhythm of hailstones, aspiring to be a meteorologist before his studies and career were turned to journalism instead. Though he often chases storms, he prefers living in the cooler, more tranquil weather of the Blue Ridge. He moved to Roanoke in 1999 to take a job on the copy desk of The Roanoke Times; writing headlines and editing copy is his principal work for the newspaper today.
Each May, Kevin assists Pulaski County High School / Virginia Tech meteorology instructor Dave Carroll in leading college and high school students to the Plains to observe severe weather firsthand. The accounts of many of his storm chases can be found here on the storm chasing page of his weather blog on roanoke.com.
Kevin was an editor for "Hurricanes and the Middle Atlantic States," a book written by D.C.-area weather enthusiast Rick Schwartz and published by Blue Diamond Books that documents hurricanes striking the mid-Atlantic states since colonial times.
The Weather Journal column began in 2003 and appears on Friday's Virginia section front in The Roanoke Times. The Weather Journal blog began in 2006 and follows weather day-by-day between the larger columns.
Whirlwind of definitions can apply to the commonly used word 'cyclone'
By Kevin Myatt
The Roanoke Times
Back in the 1980s, my junior high school changed its nickname to the "Cyclones," matching the storm theme of the crosstown junior high rival Whirlwinds and the high school Hurricane.
But what is a "cyclone?" The image created to represent our school was a golden tornado with a mouth and eyes. A certain weather-geek ninth-grader knew our administrators didn't have a good meteorological grasp on what a cyclone should be.
There are several correct answers to the question, "What is a cyclone?"
n A cyclone is, in the Indian Ocean, exactly the same thing as hurricanes and typhoons elsewhere. This is what hit Myanmar over the weekend, killing tens of thousands.
n All tropical depressions, tropical storms and hurricanes by any name are broadly categorized as tropical cyclones.
n All low-pressure systems are cyclones. This includes run-of-the-mill low-pressure systems -- those big L's on a weather map -- that help produce our rain and snow, as well as more intense systems such as nor'easters. Cyclones feature rising updrafts and rotate counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere, spun by the Earth's rotation. They rotate clockwise south of the equator.
n Tornadoes in the 1800s and early 1900s were often called cyclones in historic accounts. Almost all tornadoes are in fact cyclones, or counterclockwise-spinning updrafts, but a tiny percentage rotate clockwise and are therefore anticyclones.
So there is a brief rundown of many things a cyclone can be. You can spin it any way you want.
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