This is Science Quickly. I'm Andrea Thompson, Scientific American's

news editor for Earth Environment. Some are mean sun, heat, sand, and the start of hurricane season

in the Atlantic Ocean. From June 1st to November 30th, tropical stormed hurricanes can spin

up over the warm waters, bringing punishing winds, torrential rains, and pounding surf when they

hit land. Our ability to forecast these massive storms has improved considerably in the last few

decades, but they can still throw us plenty of curveballs to help us understand the secrets of

these meteorological mysteries. We're talking to Kim Wood, an assistant professor of meteorology

at Mississippi State University. Hey Kim, thanks for joining us. Thank you. I'm happy to be here.

So to start with, what happens to turn a mishmash of thunderstorms into this monster cyclone,

you know, really take us into the heart of the beast? So when a storm has the potential to become

a tropical cyclone, the generic term for a tropical storm or a hurricane, it needs certain

ingredients to be in place. So we need those thunderstorms to be there as sort of the seed

disturbance, but for that to then become this organized storm, the ocean needs to be warm enough

to provide energy to keep those thunderstorms going. There needs to be air rising. There needs

to be moisture because they're clouds. They need that water vapor to exist. And there's something

called vertical wind shear, which is a change in wind speed or direction with height. And if there

isn't much of that, the thunderstorms can build more straight upward. And that makes them more

efficient in turning that ocean energy into becoming a tropical cyclone. So once it starts to get

organized, you get that rotation there. Then that ongoing circulation, once it's in place,

that helps continue focusing the energy. So it can intensify further. Great. Now can you describe

a little bit the components of a hurricane? You know, people might hear about the eye or the

eye wall. You know, what are those and how do they kind of lead into perpetuating the strength

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