What's the difference between a tornado and a hurricane?

Answer 1

tornada is on land
hurricane is on water
chin

Answer 2

Try this experiment. Place your hand in room temperature water. Now lift it out. You should feel a cooling effect as the water evaporates from your hand. If it is a windy day you will feel more of a cooling effect. So evaporation cools, and the opposite of evaporation is condensation. What might condensation do? You guessed it heat and heat rises. Rain is caused by condensation. The more rain the more heat, under proper circumstances as the heat rises it pulls in more moist warm air that condenses and causes heat and rain. The cycle begins.

Both Hurricanes and tornadoes are caused by this forced lifting. I can not imagine a tornado that is a mile wide. That would be very, very wide for a tornado. They are quite tall, I don't know the facts but I have seen tornadoes and my guess is they could be 15 to 20 miles long. Tornadoes have stronger winds but are small by comparison to hurricanes. The damage they do is confined to a few neighborhoods and you will probably get your power back after a few days.

Hurricanes start with feeder bands, gusts of wind and rain for a few minutes then calm. A small hurricane is many times larger than the smallest of tornadoes. This is the main difference, and the answer to your question. Hurricanes can be several hundred miles wide. I have lived in Florida for more than 40 years and I have been through several hurricanes. It is difficult not to know days in advance when a hurricane approaches. A tornado is most of the time a surprise, you are lucky to have 5 minutes warning.

In my opinion the main danger from hurricanes comes after the storm. Many millions of people could be without power. Restoration takes months. The next time you see your local power company person tell them thanks for coming to Florida last year. We appreciate the help. How would you like a live power line laying in your back yard? No street lights. Trees blocking every road. Lift stations for sewage can't lift without power, raw sewage floods the streets. No air conditioning in this hot humid climate is difficult mosquitoes take over. How will you cook? What will you cook? The Solid Waste Authority is so backed up they convert entire parks and golf courses into make shift compost facilites. I hope this helps

Answer 3

A tornado occurs over land and is very small in size in comparison to a hurricane. Wind speed is generally stronger in a tornado, but the area affected is very small. Tornado's are also unpredictable and generally last only a few minutes. A hurricane is a massive storm over the Atlantic or Pacific ocean that forms form an intense low pressure system. Maximum sustained winds must be in excess of 74 mph. Hurricanes rotate around the center of circulation (also called the eye), where the winds are the most intense.
All in all, a hurricane is a BIG storm over water, a tornado is just a small part of a storm

Answer 4

Most of the Hurricanes that hit the US start forming over Africa during hurricane season. As the Tropical depression moves west over the ocean it gathers strength until it is big enough to be called a Hurricane.

Tornadoes form over land with the majority being created in tornado ally in the Midwest.

Water spouts are the rare tornado that touches either the ocean or lake. I was near the Great Salt Lake in Utah when one touched down there. I got really soaked in a matter of seconds.

Answer 5

You can have either over land or water. The difference is magnitude and duration. Tormados form when two air masses collide, usually over land. They are very destructive, but they do not last very long, in a matter of minutes they can be gone. Hurricanes form over warm water. As the warm ocean water evaporates into the sky, it rises and creates a low pressure area that begins to spin slowly counter-clockwise. It grows in size and intensity until winds reach 74 mph, when it is considered a hurricane. Hurricanes can spawn tornados. But most often, the major damage from a hurricane is from storm surge. Tornados are typically gone after a few miles and destroy a path of a few hundred yards wide. Hurricanes travel thousands of miles over several days and can be hundreds of miles wide.

Answer 6

The difference between a Hurricane and a Tornado...

-Hurricane: a severe tropical cyclone usually with heavy rains and winds moving a 73-136 knots (12 on the Beaufort scale)

-Tornado: a localized and violently destructive windstorm occurring over land characterized by a funnel-shaped cloud extending toward the ground.

So the main difference is that hurricanes are tropical storms that form over the ocean and tornadoes are from high winds over land. So when you want to remember it just remember hurricanes is to water as torando is to land.

-Azooga-

Answer 7

Tornadoes can be over water. They are called waterspouts over water. Tornadoes are a funnel cloud destroying things on the Earth's surface. They have very strong winds that can go up to 75 MPH. And Tornadoes move at fast speeds too. But Tornadoes only last like 15-35 minutes. They are more common in the midwest and great plains. And occur mostly from late march to mid June.

Hurricanes form in the Atlantic ocean or Caribbean Sea. They are swirrring clouds that bring even more wind and lots nad lots of rain. Hurricanes move only at 25 MPH or less. Some move only 5 MPH. And they can last up to 9 days. They are more common in the Caribbean Sea, the Atlantic coast of the US, and the Gulf of Mexico. They usually occur from June to October.

Answer 8

Remember Tornados can happen over land or water. When they are over water they are called water spouts.



Tornadoes

Tornadoes occur in most parts of the world. However they are most frequent over the continental plains of the USA.

Tornadoes are typically identified as a funnel of spiraling air descending from the base of clouds to the earth. The tornado is usually narrow, about 1/2 km wide and rarely does it move more than 20 km.

Like hurricanes the precise mechanism of how the funnel forms in not understood.

Hurricane

Tropical Storms start within 8º and 15º north and south of the equator where surface sea temperatures reach 27ºC. The air above the warm sea is heated and rises. This causes low pressure.


The weather system generates heat which powers the storm, causing wind speeds to increase. This causes the Tropical Storm to sustain itself. Tropical storms rely on plenty of warm, moist air from the sea - this is why they die out over land.

The central part of the tropical storm is known as the eye. The eye is usually between 30-50km across. It is an area of calm, with light winds and no rain. It contains descending air. Large cumulonimbus clouds surround the eye. These are caused by moist air condensing as it rises. Wind speeds average 160km per hour around the eye

Answer 9

Where to begin. BIG DIFFERENCE. I live in Illinois, I've never seen a hurricane, but I've seen roughly 10 tornadoes. A hurricane starts in the ocean, tornadoes are on the land. I can't explain it more, but it's kind of common sense.

Answer 10

A hurricane or cyclone (what we call then in Australia) is a large storm with winds over 70 miles per hour, they are usually a couple of miles across.

While a tornado is a vertical rotating column of air (a twister) these tend to happen in the middle of a storm surge. They range from a couple metres across to up to a half a mile wide. They also happen on water, expect they are know as a water spout.

Answer 11

A tornado is on land, a hurricane is over the water.

Once a hurricane hits land, it starts falling apart, eventually becoming a tropical storm. A tornado, on the other hand, builds in strength over land.