Weather trivia: 65 amazing facts about our daily frenemy!

Weather is a state that every one of us chech every day of the week! Depending on it we make our plans and daily habits!

So let’s find out some amazing facts and trivia about the weather!

1. Weather is the state of the atmosphere
2. Describing for example the degree to which it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy
3. Most weather phenomena occur in the lowest level of the atmosphere, the troposphere, just below the stratosphere
4. Weather refers to day-to-day temperature and precipitation activity
5. Whereas climate is the term for the averaging of atmospheric conditions over longer periods of time
6. When used without qualification, “weather” is generally understood to mean the weather of Earth
7. Weather is driven by air pressure, temperature and moisture differences between one place and another
8. These differences can occur due to the sun’s angle at any particular spot, which varies with latitude
9. The strong temperature contrast between polar and tropical air gives rise to the largest scale atmospheric circulations
10. The Hadley Cell
11. The Ferrel Cell
12. The Polar Cell
13. And the jet stream
14. Weather systems in the mid-latitudes, such as extratropical cyclones, are caused by instabilities of the jet stream flow
15. Because the Earth’s axis is tilted relative to its orbital plane
16. Sunlight is incident at different angles at different times of the year
17. On Earth’s surface, temperatures usually range ±40 °C (−40 °F to 100 °F) annually
18. Over thousands of years, changes in Earth’s orbit can affect the amount and distribution of solar energy received by the Earth
19. Thus influencing long-term climate and global climate change
20. Surface temperature differences in turn cause pressure differences
21. Higher altitudes are cooler than lower altitudes
22. As most atmospheric heating is due to contact with the Earth’s surface
23. While radiative losses to space are mostly constant
24. Weather forecasting is the application of science and technology to predict the state of the atmosphere for a future time and a given location
25. The Earth’s weather system is a chaotic system
26. As a result, small changes to one part of the system can grow to have large effects on the system as a whole
27. Human attempts to control the weather have occurred throughout history
28. And there is evidence that human activities such as agriculture and industry have modified weather patterns
29. Studying how the weather works on other planets has been helpful in understanding how weather works on Earth
30. A famous landmark in the Solar System, Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, is an anticyclonic storm known to have existed for at least 300 years
31. However, weather is not limited to planetary bodies
32. A star’s corona is constantly being lost to space, creating what is essentially a very thin atmosphere throughout the Solar System
33. The movement of mass ejected from the Sun is known as the solar wind
34. On Earth, the common weather phenomena include wind, cloud, rain, snow, fog and dust storms
35. Less common events include natural disasters such as tornadoes, hurricanes, typhoons and ice storms
36. Almost all familiar weather phenomena occur in the troposphere
37. Weather does occur in the stratosphere and can affect weather lower down in the troposphere
38. The exact mechanisms are poorly understood
39. Weather occurs primarily due to air pressure, temperature and moisture differences between one place to another
40. These differences can occur due to the sun angle at any particular spot, which varies by latitude from the tropics
41. In other words, the farther from the tropics one lies, the lower the sun angle is, which causes those locations to be cooler due the spread of the sunlight over a greater surface
42. The strong temperature contrast between polar and tropical air gives rise to the large scale atmospheric circulation cells and the jet stream
43. Weather systems in the mid-latitudes, such as extratropical cyclones, are caused by instabilities of the jet stream flow
44. Weather systems in the tropics, such as monsoons or organized thunderstorm systems, are caused by different processes
45. Because the Earth’s axis is tilted relative to its orbital plane, sunlight is incident at different angles at different times of the year
46. In June the Northern Hemisphere is tilted towards the sun, so at any given Northern Hemisphere latitude sunlight falls more directly on that spot than in December
47. This effect causes seasons
48. Over thousands to hundreds of thousands of years, changes in Earth’s orbital parameters affect the amount and distribution of solar energy received by the Earth and influence long-term climate
49. The uneven solar heating can also be due to the weather itself in the form of cloudiness and precipitation
50. Higher altitudes are typically cooler than lower altitudes, which the result of higher surface temperature and radiational heating, which produces the adiabatic lapse rate
51. In some situations, the temperature actually increases with height
52. This phenomenon is known as an inversion and can cause mountaintops to be warmer than the valleys below
53. Inversions can lead to the formation of fog and often act as a cap that suppresses thunderstorm development
54. On local scales, temperature differences can occur because different surfaces have differing physical characteristics such as reflectivity, roughness, or moisture content
55. Surface temperature differences in turn cause pressure differences
56. A hot surface warms the air above it causing it to expand and lower the density and the resulting surface air pressure
57. The resulting horizontal pressure gradient moves the air from higher to lower pressure regions, creating a wind, and the Earth’s rotation then causes deflection of this air flow due to the Coriolis effect
58. The simple systems thus formed can then display emergent behaviour to produce more complex systems and thus other weather phenomena
59. Large scale examples include the Hadley cell while a smaller scale example would be coastal breezes
60. The atmosphere is a chaotic system
61. As a result, small changes to one part of the system can accumulate and magnify to cause large effects on the system as a whole
62. This atmospheric instability makes weather forecasting less predictable than tides or eclipses
63. Although it is difficult to accurately predict weather more than a few days in advance
64. Weather forecasters are continually working to extend this limit through meteorological research and refining current methodologies in weather prediction
65. However, it is theoretically impossible to make useful day-to-day predictions more than about two weeks ahead, imposing an upper limit to potential for improved prediction skill