Webcast


Polar Lows - Arctic Hurricane

length
50 Minutes

author
Justyna Wodziczko

Polar Lows - Arctic Hurricane

Published: 29 March 2012

Polar Lows are generally characterized by a severe weather in form of a strong winds, showers and occasionally heavy snow, which had sometimes resulted in lost of lives, especially on the sea area. Sometimes these systems are also connected with term Arctic Hurricane, which had been used for especially intense Polar lows. Compromising definition of Polar low is small, but fairly intense low in maritime regions. They are formed in cold air outbreaks, north of the polar front, mostly in the regions east of 0°E and south of 75°N. Favorable season for them is cold part of the year. By size, they are smaller than the ordinary synoptic lows (200-600 km) with the life-span typically around 18 hours, and with very intense change of weather. As it is said before, within these Polar lows very strong winds can occur (15-25 KT, max. 52 KT) so understanding of these systems is of a great safety (and other) importance. All these facts and very nice example of Polar lows are presented by Justyna Wodziczko, from Norwegian Meteorological Institute.

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Filed under Keywords:

Conceptual Models, Synoptic Scale Meteorology, Frontal Structures, Frontal Substructures, Convection, Cold Air Outbreak, Polar Low, Cyclogenesis