Typhoons and galaxies

[Bart]

An interesting comparison of the images of typhoons and galaxies is shown on link:

 

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/26262175/TyphoonAndGalaxies.pdf

 

What do you think about it?

[StringJunky]

Your link doesn't work for me.

[BearOfNH]

I can see the pictures OK. But I don't think there's anything special. The weather picture is far more dense. You might do better with a rotary lawn sprinkler, shot from above.

[michel123456]

If I am not abused, in a galaxy the spiral is the cosequence of Keppler 2nd law. The objects orbit the galaxy as planets do in the solar system. If there were more planets in the solar system it would show its spiral more evidently. I began this other very interesting thread that interested almost nobody.

[BearOfNH]

[...] If there were more planets in the solar system it would show its spiral more evidently. [...]

 

If there were more planets in the solar system they would crash into each other, reducing the number of planets. Hmmm, does the asteroid belt bear any resemblance to a galaxy (within the confines of the belt, that is).

Edited November 27, 2013 by BearOfNH

[pantheory]

They are called typhoons in the southern hemisphere and hurricanes in the northern hemisphere. I agree that the similarities to spiral galaxies cannot be denied. I think the similarities are related to our misunderstandings of spiral galaxy mechanics. In storms there is a pressure difference in the surrounding atmosphere which spirals clouds in from high to low pressure volumes. The is also how I think spiral galaxies work. I think spriral galaxies appearances are based upon a background field like an aether. Today's "aether" ideas are dark matter and a Higgs field although I would expect such particulates in such a field are vastly smaller than any modern theory presently could allow.

[swansont]

They are called typhoons in the southern hemisphere and hurricanes in the northern hemisphere. I agree that the similarities to spiral galaxies cannot be denied. I think the similarities are related to our misunderstandings of spiral galaxy mechanics. In storms there is a pressure difference in the surrounding atmosphere which spirals clouds in from high to low pressure volumes. The is also how I think spiral galaxies work.

Or maybe it's just that there is such a thing as angular momentum, which is conserved in the absence of an external torque or is changed when there is an external torque. Rotating systems following the rules that rotating systems follow isn't an earth-shattering concept in my book.

[Ophiolite]

They are called typhoons in the southern hemisphere and hurricanes in the northern hemisphere

No. Typhoons in the Far East. Hurricanes elsewhere.

[MigL]

I always thought pantheory's explanation was the right one Ophiolite.

Typhoons and hurricanes rotate in opposite directions in northern and southern hemispheres, just like your sink or toilet bowl, due to Coriolis effects ( radial movement in a rotating frame of reference ), hence the different nomenclature.

Do you have a reference, I'd really like to know if its just an east/west thing?

[StringJunky]

MigL, on 04 Dec 2013 - 9:08 PM, said:

I always thought pantheory's explanation was the right one Ophiolite.

Typhoons and hurricanes rotate in opposite directions in northern and southern hemispheres, just like your sink or toilet bowl, due to Coriolis effects ( radial movement in a rotating frame of reference ), hence the different nomenclature.

Do you have a reference, I'd really like to know if its just an east/west thing?

 

 

Hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons are all the same weather phenomenon; we just use different names for these storms in different places. In the Atlantic and Northeast Pacific, the term “hurricane” is used. The same type of disturbance in the Northwest Pacific is called a “typhoon” and “cyclones” occur in the South Pacific and Indian Ocean.

 

http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/cyclone.html

[MigL]

Thanks for the clarifications swansont and StringJunky.

[imatfaal]

I always thought pantheory's explanation was the right one Ophiolite.

Typhoons and hurricanes rotate in opposite directions in northern and southern hemispheres, just like your sink or toilet bowl, due to Coriolis effects ( radial movement in a rotating frame of reference ), hence the different nomenclature.

Do you have a reference, I'd really like to know if its just an east/west thing?

 

Stringjunky quoted a definition from the NOAA which I think was a little unintentionally misleading.

 

There is a Northern Hemisphere / Southern Hemisphere difference just this is not represented in the names; typhoons and hurricanes (same things just the USA office calls them Hurricanes and the Japanese Typhoons) are cyclonic weather systems around a low pressure centre. Cyclonic systems rotate anti-clockwise in the north and clockwise in the south. So a severe cyclonic weather system in the southern hemisphere - regardless of who names it - will be going in the opposite angular direction to a cyclonic weather system in the northern hemisphere. The Australians, who I think provide most of the info and do the ad-hoc naming etc for pacific area, refer to these as simply tropical cyclones. Not sure there are enough land-bound high maintained speed storms in the southern for an agreed hurricane naming system

 

You can more rarely get anticyclonic tropical storms - these rotate in the opposite directions to cylconic; ie anticyclones go anti-clockwise in the southern, clockwise in the northern, and are around a patch of high pressure.

 

And it does all come down to coriolis effect - but the bathwater down the plug hole is, I am afraid, still nonsense.

[swansont]

!

Moderator Note

 

Discussion specifically on the coriolis force has been moved

http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/80495-coriolis-force/

 

[michel123456]

Where is Bart?

[Ophiolite]

I always thought pantheory's explanation was the right one Ophiolite.

Then why do we have typhoons hitting Hong Kong and the Phillipines? I don't think you are suggesting that the winds have blown them north of the equator.

[MigL]

Or maybe I confused typhoons with cyclones. My apologies.

[Ophiolite]

Or maybe I confused typhoons with cyclones. My apologies.

No need to apologise. I can see how the confusion could easily arise.

 

On a segue to nothing directly related, in World War II the Typhoon was a partially successful replacement for the Hurricane. The latter was the fighter that, with the Sptifire, defended Britain during the blitz. And, as you likely know, blitz is German for lightning, of which there is plenty in typhoons and hurricanes.

[MigL]

Aviation buff ?

Typhoons may not have been built in numbers comparable to Hurricanes, but the European war was nearly over by the time it entered service. It was a much more powerful machine ( size, speed etc.) and was in service in the middle east ( Egypt I believe ) well into the 50s.

 

Britain's new protector ( and Germany's. Italy's and Spain's ) is the Eurofighter Typhoon.

[Ophiolite]

Aviation buff ?

Not really. Just very old.

(I had to check wikipedia to find out what the Typhoon was, I recalled it was a WWII fighter, but half thought it was an American plane!)