Weather

35.1 THE AMOSPHERE







TERM SCIENTIFIC DEFINITION

Atmosphere The thin envelope of gases surrounding our planet

Climate The general weather pattern that occurs over time

1. What are the two primary gases that make up the

atmosphere, and what are their percentages?

Oxygen, 21% and Nitrogen, 78%

2. TRUE or FALSE; Earth’s atmosphere is a mixture of gases

and tiny particles called aerosols that included dust, ash,

and air pollution.

3. What re the six factors in the atmosphere that can change?

Cloudiness, atmospheric pressure, wind, precipitation,

humidity and temperature

 Physics: Atmospheric Pressure

4. What causes air pressure?

The weight of air molecules pressing

down on the earth

5. Why don’t we feel this pressure?

The pressure inside our bodies is equal

to the pressure being exerted on it.

6. Why does the density of the air decrease

as altitude increases?

Air is a compressed gas. As altitude

increases there is less gravity acting on

the molecules and they spread out,

making the air less dense.



7. What are the three common units of

measurement for atmospheric pressure

and what are their values at sea level?

 Millibars: 1013.25, mmHg: 760, psi: 14.7

 35.2 The structure of the atmosphere

TOPIC MAIN IDEA

The structure of the Atmosphere Four, distinct layers, Troposphere, Stratosphere,

Mesosphere, Thermosphere

8. TRUE OR FALSE: The Troposphere

contains about 70% of the atmosphere’s

total mass and has an average thickness

of about 6km

9. The is a layer where weather

occurs

10. A molecule made up of three

oxygen atoms, accumulates in the

stratosphere and absorbs solar

energy

11. Match the zone to the temperature

range

a Mesosphere c 20’C to-50’C

b Stratosphere b -60’C to 0’C

c Troposphere a 0c to -90’C

d Thermosphere d 500’C to 1500’C

 12. What causes the Aurora borealis?

 Charged particles in the ionosphere that are

excited by solar radiation







 13. Match the atmospheric zones to their location

a Mesosphere d 1 to 12 km above Earth’s surface

b Ionosphere c 12 to 50 km above Earth’s surface

c Stratosphere a 50 to 80 km above Earth’s surface

d Troposphere e 80 km and higher above Earth’s surface

e Thermosphere b Includes the upper mesosphere and lower thermosphere



14. What is solar radiation?

Electromagnetic energy given off by the Sun

15. TRUE or FALSE: Energy and wavelength are related proportionately

16. Almost all the solar radiation that is directed toward earth is high

energy, short wave length radiation that passes through the atmosphere.

How is the atmosphere heated?

By the heat given off by the Earth’s surface

 17. How is energy returned to space?

 Long wave radiation given off by the Earth’s surface

 18. ____________ radiation is the source of most of the atmosphere’s

Terrestrial

heat.

 19. How do Greenhouse gases warm the atmosphere?

 By absorbing the long-wavelength radiation instead of reflecting it

 20. List 3 greenhouse gases?

 Water vapor, carbon dioxide and methane

 21. If there where no greenhouse gases in the upper atmosphere,

causing the greenhouse effect, what would be the Earth’s temperature?

 -18’C

 22. Why is it called the green house effect?

 Because it acts just like a floral

 Greenhouse. Visible energy is allowed in

 But the infra-red heating energy waves

 Are trapped inside and reflected back to

 The surface

 35.3 TEMPERATURE DEPENDS UPON LATITUDE

TOPIC MAIN IDEA

Temperature and Latitude Latitude affects temperature as the Sun strikes

these different latitudes at different angles which

affects the solar intensity



23. How do the lines of longitude run?

They circle the Earth running North to South

24. The Prime Meridian is the line of longitude that runs through

Greenwich England and, by international agreement is 0’ longitude



25. The equator is an imaginary line that circles Earth dividing it into

the Northern and Southern Hemispheres

Greenwich, England

26. How are the lines of latitude drawn?

Parallel to the equator

27. TRUE OR FALSE: Lines of latitude

Are drawn perpendicular to the lines of

longitude

 28. If you where to draw a line from the

center of the Earth so that it would

intersect one of the lines of latitude,

what angle would make it with the

Equator?

 An angle equal to the latitude it

intersected

29. Climate zones are defined based on

their average sea level temperatures.

What are these five zones?

 North Polar, North Temperate, Tropical



 South Temperate, South Polar



30. Why is high noon over the equatorial

areas warmer than high noon over

higher latitudes?

The light at noon is most perpendicular to

the equatorial area and therefore more

concentrated. The light striking at an

angle would be spread out over a larger

area so it would be less concentrated

making the area cooler

35.4 WHY ARE THERE SEASONS? Idaho Winter



31. How does the tilt of the Earth’s axis affect the

seasons?

When the Northern Hemisphere is tilted towards the

sun those rays are more concentrated, which warms

that area more than the Southern Hemisphere that is

tilted away from the Sun

32. What does equinox mean? What language is it?

Equal Night, from the Latin language

33. Match the term with its definition Idaho Summer

a Summer Solstice b Shortest day of the year



b Winter Solstice a Longest day of the year

TERM SCIENTIFIC DEFINITION

WIND Air flowing horizontally from a region of high pressure to a region of

lower pressure





34. What causes wind?

Differences in air pressure. The larger the

difference the stronger the winds

35. How are winds named?

According to their strength and their direction

36. TRUE OR FALSE: Warm air that transfers away from our bodies is

held in place by our hair and clothes.

37. Extreme cold and bring on frostbit and Hypothermia

38. Death from freezing occurs when the body does not have enough

heat to perform Chemical reactions that sustain life

 35.6 SOME WINDS ARE LOCAL - OTHERS ARE GLOBAL

Vocabulary Term After Your Reading



Trade Winds Global winds between 0’ and 30’ latitude

Westerlies Winds that travel west to east between 30’ and 60’ latitude

Easterlies Winds that travel from east to west at the polar latitudes

between 60’ and 90’

 39. Match each type of wind with its description



a Local Winds b Produced by planet scale pressure differences

b Global Winds a Produced by geographical temperature differences

40. Regarding local winds, why is it that during the day the wind usually

blows from the ocean over the land?

The land has a lower specific heat capacity

so the air over the land heats up faster, rises

and creates a low pressure area. The ocean air

has a higher pressure and so moves towards

the lower pressure, the land



41. Why is it that during the night the local winds usually blow from the

mountains to the valleys?

The air at higher elevations quickly cools, at night, and becomes

heavier so it flows downhill into the valleys

 42. All winds are caused by air flowing from the area of higher pressure

to an area of lower pressure. What causes Global winds?

 The uneven heating of the equatorial regions compared to the polar

regions

 43. At equatorial latitudes, what happens to the air when the Sun heats

it?

The air rises and flows towards the cooler regions

 44. The six circulating wind belts are called



 Convection cells



 45. Where are the wind belts located?



 Two are between 0’ and 30’



 Two are between 30’ and 60’



 Two are between 60’ and 90’



 46. What are the doldrums?



 Areas of little or no wind near the equator



 47. Where are the Horse latitudes?



 At the 30’ north and south latitudes



 48. What are the Jet Streams?



 High Speed, high altitude winds that can effect weather patterns

 PHYSICS: THE CORIOLIS EFFECT

 It is better to communicate good information than to offer

misinformation in the name of good communication.

Why do teachers claim that a draining sink reflects the rotation of the

Earth?



A surprisingly large number of undergraduate students tell their

college instructors that their high-school teachers told them that sinks

drain in opposite directions in the two hemispheres owing to the

rotation of the Earth. Why would a teacher offer such nonsense to

students when it is so easy to check. A trip to the school washroom (let

alone the ones at home) will reveal drainage in both directions (which

would certainly require the equator to assume a tortuous track through

the countryside).



 “Is knowledge just a bunch of abstractions to be memorized with no recourse

to the relevance of everyday experience?

Sigh... I don’t know why teachers do this. I can but assume that those who do

so just never feel any need to wash their hands --- or their minds.”

 Alistar B. Fraiser, Physics Department Penn State University

 So what should teachers tell their students?



 The direction of rotation in draining sinks and toilets is NOT

determined by the rotation of the Earth, but by rotation that was

introduced earlier when it was being filled or subsequently being

disturbed (say by washing).



 The rotation of the Earth does influence the direction of rotation of

large weather systems and large vortices in the oceans, for these are

very long-lived phenomena and so allow the very weak Coriolis force to

produce a significant effect, with time.



 The fact that the Coriolis force is zero at the equator and very weak

near the equator explains why tropical cyclones such as hurricanes

and typhoons won't form on the equator, nor will they cross the

equator. As they approach the equator they lose their energy. Tropical

storms develop in their hemisphere and stay in their hemisphere



The Coriolis force is noticeable only for large-scale motions such as winds

and the affect those winds have on other, large bodies.

 49. What is the Coriolis Effect?

 The tendency of large moving bodies not attached to the Earth (such

as air) to move to clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and

counterclockwise in the Southern Hemisphere due to the Earth’s

rotation

 35.7 Ocean Currents



Vocabulary Term After You Read

Currents Streams of water that move

relative to the larger ocean



Cyres Surface water currents in that form

giant circular flow patterns caused

by the Coriolis Effect as well as

other factors



50. What causes surface currents?

Global winds pushing water in the same direction as the wind

51. How do surface currents redistribute heat?

By carrying warm waters to cooler areas where warm those waters

52. Where does the Gulf Stream flow, and what area is warmed by it?

Up the eastern coast of North America, across the North Atlantic to Great

Britain and Norway and then warming Europe

 38.8 WATER IN THE ATMOSHPERE



Cirrus Clouds Cumulus Clouds Stratus Clouds

Differences

Thin and wispy in Puffy with flat Flat smooth layers

appearance bottoms that cover the sky



Formed above 25,000ft Forms at 14,000ft Forms below 6500ft

and made of ice crystals



Indicate that snow Produces May produce

or rain is coming thunderstorms drizzles



Similarities

All are visible collections of billions of tiny water droplets or ice

crystals.

All form as warm, moist air rises and then cools to the dew point

which is when water condenses

 53. What is meant by the term relative humidity?

 The ratio of water vapor actually in the air to the maximum saturation

point

 54. The dew point is temperature at which the air becomes saturated



 55. How do clouds form?

 Moist, warm air rises, cools to the dew point & water vapor condenses

 56. What is precipitation?

 Water in liquid form that returns to Earth from the atmosphere

 57. List the three kinds of precipitation

 Rain, Snow and Hail

 35.9 CHANGING WEATHER – AIR MASSES, FRONTS AND CYCLONES



Vocabulary After You Read

Cyclone A System of low pressure that is associated with

severe weather

Anticyclone

An Area of high pressure that produces clear skies

and no precipitation

58. An air mass is a large pool of air that has similar temperature and

moisture characteristics throughout.

59. How do air masses form?

A large body of air stays in one place long enough to take on the

properties of the region

60. In North America, air masses are classified by the weather service

according to two characteristics. What are they?

Their Latitude and if they form over water or land

61. According to this classification, what does cP mean?

Continental Polar

62. What is it called when two air masses collide?

A Weather Front

63. When a cold air mass and a warm air mass collide, what happens to

the warm air mass.

It always rises above the cold air mass

 64. When a warm air mass is moving and displaces cold air the front is

called a warm front



 65. What is the front called when the two colliding air masses are not

moving?

 A Stationary Front

 66. When a cold air mass moves in underneath a moist, warm air mass

it is called a cold front. What is the developing weather like?

 Moist air rises, cools, clouds form and it becomes windy and rains

 67. When cirrus clouds become thicker and turn the sky into an

overcast gray, what is happening?

 A warm front is approaching the area

 68. Air masses belong to gigantic weather systems organized around

what kind of center?

 A center of high pressure or a center of low pressure

 69. In the Northern Hemisphere, which way does the air move around a

low?

 Counterclockwise

 70. Meteorologists use the letters H and L to denote high and low

pressure systems, and they use lines to show the positions of the cold

and warm fronts. What do the triangles and semicircles on the lines of

the fronts mean?

 The semicircles indicate the warm air extending into the cooler air. The

triangles indicate the cold air extending into the warmer air.