Dr. Kim Wood

In 1992...

Hurricane then-tropical storm Lester came right over Tucson.

But it coincided with a slightly bigger news story of Hurricane Andrew hitting Florida as a Category 5.

So it's a bit less talked about than the devastating Andrew.

So tropical cyclone is what we'd call the generic term for all of these systems.

They then get more specific names depending on where they are.

So if they're in the North Atlantic or Eastern North Pacific, they're hurricanes once they reach 74 miles an hour.

So the North Atlantic Cyclone.

If they're in the western North Pacific, they're typhoons.

And then in the southern hemisphere, they tend to use the broader term cyclone.

Sometimes they'll say severe cyclonic storm.

I think that's in the Indian Ocean.

But broadly speaking, if it's a tropical depression, tropical storm, hurricane, typhoon, they're all categories of tropical cyclone.

It is a cyclonic system, but it is very, very, very tiny by comparison.

A hurricane can produce tornadoes.

Yikes.

Tornadoes cannot produce hurricanes.

Oh, do you have a semester?

What makes a hurricane a hurricane is they're a type of cyclone and they have a low pressure.

So they're lower in pressure at the center compared to on the outside.