[RINGING] Hi. It’s Doug. If you’ve ever played with a fan before, you know you can create wind inside. But I’m curious, what’s the strongest wind you’ve ever experienced? Has it ever been so windy that you get knocked down by the wind? Well, someone named Caitlin has a question for us
About one of the strongest windstorms on earth– hurricanes. Let’s give her a call now. [RINGING] Hi Doug. Hi Caitlin. I have a question for you. What makes hurricanes so dangerous? That’s a great question. First of all, what even is a hurricane anyway? This is the view of a hurricane from space.
That’s the hurricane right there. You probably know that a hurricane is a wind storm. But they’re not just any windstorm. They’re huge. That, right there, is the US state of Florida. So a hurricane is as big as an entire state. A hurricane actually starts out in the ocean.
Now as long as ships avoid them out there, people are fine. It’s when a hurricane reaches land that you get real trouble. As a hurricane gets close to land, everyone in its path is asked to evacuate, to get in cars and buses and leave, to try to get far away. But why?
Do you really have to leave just because a windstorm is coming? What do you know about hurricanes? Why do you think they’re so dangerous? Now would be a good time to pause the video and discuss. OK. Are you ready? One thing you might have thought is hurricane winds are really strong, right?
But how strong? Strong enough to knock down houses? The answer is they can be that strong. But it depends on the hurricane. Not every hurricane is the same. Scientists have divided hurricanes up into five different groups, or categories, based on how fast the winds are.
In a category 1 or 2 hurricane, you might not even need to evacuate. But the winds are strong. You do have to be careful of things flying around. People often put boards over their windows in case anything flies into them. The worst kinds of hurricanes are category 4 and 5.
These are hurricanes with winds as strong as 130 miles an hour. Here you can see this news reporter is having to take cover. And watch carefully behind him. Right there. You see that? That’s part of a roof blowing away. Here’s another example.
Watch as the winds blow off at first the shingles on the roof of this house, and then– [PEOPLE YELLING] –the whole roof itself. Let’s watch that again [PEOPLE YELLING] The strong winds of a hurricane don’t just blow roofs off houses. There’s also another danger. Remember that hurricanes always start in the ocean.
So as they arrive, those same strong winds have been pushing the surface of the ocean along with them, bringing ocean waves high up onto the shore. Normally ocean waves just crash along the beach. But during a hurricane, the winds are so strong that it sweeps ocean water all the way up
Onto the land, causing flooding and sometimes knocking cars and debris into things. When hurricanes push ocean water up onto the land like this, it has a special name. It’s called a storm surge. It’s because of storm surges that people who live along the coast often have to build their houses like this.
They build them up on stilts so that the water of the storm surge can pass underneath. It looks kind of funny but it helps. There’s one other thing that makes hurricanes so dangerous. These, the clouds. From space, a hurricane looks like this big, swirling, white pinwheel of fluffy clouds. It almost looks fun.
But each of those fluffy clouds are actually giant rainstorms that are dumping tons and tons of rain. So hurricanes aren’t just strong windstorms. They’re also huge rainstorms. When it rains too much like this in a short amount of time, the land starts to flood. So in summary, hurricanes are so dangerous
Because of strong winds and storm surges that knock things over and cause flooding along the coast. Plus incredibly heavy rains. The places most in danger from hurricanes are near the ocean. And people who live there may need to evacuate if a hurricane is heading toward them. That’s all for this week’s question.
Thanks, Caitlin, for asking it. Now for the next episode, I reached into my question jar and found three questions submitted to me that I’m thinking about answering. When this video is done playing, you’ll get to vote on one. You can choose from why do leaves
Change color in the fall, why do cows always look like they’re chewing, or why do we have power lines. I want to hear from all of you watching. So submit your vote when the video is over. There are mysteries all around us. Stay curious and see you next week.
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