To start off, the thunderstorm needs to have a rotating low pressure area called a mesocyclone, covering an area 2 to 6 miles wide. This usually occurs in the rear portion of a supercell, but can also develop within a squall line, often on the north side of a bow echo. A downdraft can occur near the mesocyclone and wrap around the bottom portion, causing it to tighten and intensify and stretch toward the ground, producing a tornado.
The power of a tornado comes from the thunderstorm that produces it. A thunderstorm is powered by the energy that water vapor releases when it condenses. Differences in wind speed and direction wind altitude, a condition called wind shear, sets these storms rotating. This rotation can then tighten and intensify to form a tornado.
Tornadoes form in the updraft portion of a thunderstorm, where warm, moist air rises.
The energy is stored in the air as thermal energy. A supercell thunderstorm turns that into kinetic energy in the form of rotating wind. Under the right conditions that rotation can form a tornado.
They are the same because they both are classified as storms and can cause damage via wind. They are different because a thunderstorm does not have a funnel of wind like a tornado. A tornado itself does not produce rain or lightning, but the thunderstorm that spawned the tornado can. Also, the winds in a tornado are more violent than those just caused by a thunderstorm.
A tornado moves with its parent thunderstorm. The storm itself is carried by the winds in the environment it forms in.
No, a tornado cannot form without a thunderstorm. A tornado needs the crossing winds of two air masses to provide rotation in order for a tornado to form. Tornadoes do not form from convection thunderstorms, but only from air mass thunderstorms.
Yes. A tornado can't form without a thunderstorm.
Yes. All tornadoes form in thunderstorms.
Because only the the energy involved in a thunderstorm or developing thunderstorm is enough to form something as strong as a tornado.
A dust devil resembles a tornado on some levels, but is not as strong and does not form from a thunderstorm.
No. A even a small thunderstorm is larger than very large tornado. This is partly due to the fact that tornadoes form within thunderstorms.
A tornado is a violently rotating columns of air in contact with the base of a thunderstorm and the ground. Tornadoes are usually produced by a type of strong thunderstorm called a supercell.
The weather usually clears after a tornado because most tornadoes form in the rear portion of a thunderstorm.
Yes. Tornadoes form during severe thunderstorms.
Yes. Tornadoes form from severe thunderstorms.
Yes, a tornado can come from a thunderstorm. In fact, a tornado cannot be caused by anything other than a thunderstorm. One key facotrs is that the thunderstorm must have a rotating updraft.
a tornado is formed by a very severe thunderstorm for a tornado to form it has to have warm and moist air.