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These are the Weather Fun Facts categories:
Lightning
Hurricanes
The Extremes
Evapotranpiration
Other Fun Facts
Lightning:
According to the National Public Health Newsletter of January, 1922, the chances of
being hit by lightning is 1:28,500.
The Insurance Institute of America states the property damage caused by lightning is
over $1 billion a year. The National Lightning Safety Institute has evidence that the
damage exceeds $2 billion per year.
The average number of deaths from lightning is more than 100 a year with several more
deaths from lightning related fires. Lightning injuries account for 3-5 times than those
of lightning deaths.
Comparative weather deaths (1940 –1984 period)
Lightning = 7,751
Tornado = 5,268
Flood = 4,481
Hurricane = 1,923
Lightning sets about 10,000 forest fires every year in the United States.
Between 1940 – 1991, lightning killed 8,316 people in the U.S.
Lightning usually appears before the rain, in a thunderstorm setting, so do not wait
for rain before suspending activities when thunder and lightning are visible.
At any given moment, there are about 1,800 thunderstorms happening around the world.
Approximately 100 lightning bolts strike the earth every second.
Lightning’s return stroke is hotter than the surface of the sun. Lightning is
50,000 degrees F. The sun is about 11,000 degrees F.
Lightning is equivalent to the electric power of 100 million light bulbs in your face.
About 156 billion, billion electrons flow down into the ground during a typical
lightning strike.
Lightning can strike the same place twice and sometimes many times. The Empire State
Building in New York City is struck an average of 23 times a year. During one thunderstorm
it was struck 8 times in 24 minutes.
Based on data from 1959 –1990, from the National Climatic Data Center, Florida
holds the record for the most people killed by lightning. There were over 300 deaths.
North Carolina comes in second with 160 deaths and Texas third with around 145 deaths.
The person that holds the title for the most times struck by lightning is the former
human lightning conductor of Virginia, ex-park ranger, Roy C. Sullivan. He was struck
seven times. He was never killed by lightning but finally took his own life in 1983
reportedly rejected by love.
Hurricanes:
In one day a hurricane can release enough energy to supply all of the nation’s
electrical needs for about six months.
A large hurricane stirs up more than a million cubic miles of the atmosphere every
second. Hurricane winds can kick up 50 foot or higher waves in the open ocean.
When a storm hits the land, it brings a mound of water that can rise to a peak height
of more than 20 feet near the eye and flood 100 miles of coast with 20 feet of water. A
typical hurricane dumps 6-12 inches of rain when it comes ashore. Some bring much more and
have caused some of our worst floods.
Hurricanes even affect the depths of the ocean. Hurricane Eloise disturbed the ocean
hundreds of feet down and created under water waves that persisted for weeks.
When a hurricane warning was issued for 300 miles off the Mexico coast, about 50
million dollars was spent for boarding up houses and closing down businesses and
manufacturing plants.
It has been computed that the energy released by a typical hurricane in one second is
greater than that produced by several atomic bombs of the Hiroshima type.
The average number of hurricanes for the past 20 years has been 10. The largest number
of hurricanes was 21 in 1933. Only one hurricane was recorded in 1890. On the average,
only two typical storms each year bring hurricane force to the United States coastal
areas.
The Extremes:
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the following meteorological records
relate to the last 150-170 years.
The highest temperature ever recorded in the United States was 134 degrees F at
Greenland Ranch in Death Valley, California.
In Wyndham, Australia, the temperature reached 90 degrees F for 333 days in 1946.
A record low of – 128.6 degrees F was recorded at Vostok, Antarctica.
By average annual rainfall, the wettest place in the world is Mawslynram, in Meghalaya
State, India with 467 ½ inches per annum.
Currently the driest state is Nevada with an annual rainfall of only nine inches.
The greatest annual rainfall in the United States was 184.56 inches at Wynooches,
Oxbow, Washington in 1931.
A total of 1,224.5 inches of snow fell over a 12-month period from February 1971 to
February 1972 at Paradise, Mt. Ranier, in Washington State. Maybe it should be called Mt.
Showier!
The greatest rainfall ever recorded in a 24-hour period was 74 inches at La Reunion
Island in the Indian Ocean.
The windiest place was in the Commonwealth Bay where gales reached 200 mph.
The heaviest hailstones on record, weighing up to 2.25 pounds were reported to have
killed 92 people in the Gopalganj district of Bangladesh on April 14, 1986.
The most widespread U.S. cold wave was in February of 1899. It was so cold that the
Mississippi River froze over its entire length, with ice as thick as two inches even in
New Orleans.
The difference between the hottest and coldest air temperatures ever recorded on the
surface of the earth is 264 degrees.
The longest period without measurable rainfall in the United States was 767 days at
Bagdad, California.
In the Eastern Sahara Desert, on average, clouds cover the sun for fewer than 100 hours
of the year.
Alaska and Hawaii have the same heat record. In Pahala, Hawaii the temperature on April
27, 1931 was 100 degrees F. Alaska’s state heat record is also 100 degrees F. on June
27, 1915 at Fort Yukon.
Evapotranspiration:
If we reduced E.T. by 1% on Earth for one day, there would be enough water to supply a
city of two million people for one year.
.1" of water on an average golf course is equal to 232,320 gallons of water,
almost enough water to fill an Olympic size swimming pool.
As of October 5, 1996, there have been 1170 unconfirmed tornadoes reported in the
United States. Through April 1996, 240 of these have been confirmed. These tornadoes have
left 24 fatalities in their wake.
A "trace" amount of rain is an amount too small to measure using a
conventional rain gauge (less than .01"). Yet if collected, it could weigh over 500
tons per square inch.
For a location having 30 inches of rain a year, each square yard receives about one
billion drops.
Other Fun Facts:
It takes about one million cloud droplets to provide enough water for one raindrop.
The total amount of precipitation the earth receives each year as snow, hail, and rain
is equivalent to 10 million gallons of water for every person in the United States.
February 1865 is the only month recorded in history not to have a full moon.
When you walk across the carpet on a dry winter day, you may create a static electrical
discharge. If the spark is the length of your thumb, the charges generated are around
85,000 volts.
Snowflakes generally fall from the sky at speeds between one and five miles per hour.
The United States uses an estimated 10 million tons of salt each year to melt ice on
the roads.
Each year American vegetation spews forth some 1,000,000 tons of pollen into the air we
breathe.
Our Newsletter contains lots of fun facts and much more, see the Weather Vane Page for more
information.
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