{"id":2468,"date":"2014-09-12T16:51:53","date_gmt":"2014-09-12T16:51:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/?p=2468"},"modified":"2023-07-14T10:44:45","modified_gmt":"2023-07-14T10:44:45","slug":"how-tornadoes-form","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/basic-meteorology\/how-tornadoes-form\/","title":{"rendered":"How Tornadoes Form"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The formation of a tornado can be broken down to three stages: 1) low level horizontal spin, 2) updraft tilting, and 3) vertical rotation.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">Stage 1 (Low Level Horizontal Spin)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-2473 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/tornado-form-stage1.png\" alt=\"tornado-form-stage1\" width=\"588\" height=\"390\" \/><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<p>Before thunderstorms develop, winds change direction and increase in speed with altitude. This creates an invisible, horizontal spinning effect in the lower atmosphere<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">Stage 2 (Updraft Tilting)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-2472 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/tornado-form-state2.png\" alt=\"tornado-form-state2\" width=\"592\" height=\"398\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Rising air within the thunderstorm updraft tilts the rotating air (stage 1) from horizontal to vertical.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">Stage 3 (Vertical Rotation)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-2471 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/tornado-form-stage3.png\" alt=\"tornado-form-stage3\" width=\"584\" height=\"390\" \/><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>An area of rotation around 2-6 miles wide now extends through much of the storm. Most tornadoes form within this area of strong rotation.<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Related Articles:<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-articles\/understanding-national-weather-service-severe-weather-outlooks\/\">Understanding National Weather Service &#8220;Severe Weather Outlook&#8221;<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"How tornadoes form\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/basic-meteorology\/how-tornadoes-form\">How tornadoes form<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Facts about tornadoes\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/basic-meteorology\/tornado-facts\">Tornado facts<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"tornado safety\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-articles\/tornado-safety\/\">Tornado Safety<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Lightning Safety\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-articles\/lightning-safety\/\">Lightning Safety<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Flood Safety\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-articles\/flood-safety\/\">Flood Safety<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"tornado myths\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-articles\/tornado-myths\">Tornado Myths<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Lightning Myths\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-articles\/lightning-myths\/\">Lightning Myths<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"The life cycle of a thunderstorm\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/basic-meteorology\/the-life-cycle-of-thunderstorms\">Life cycle of thunderstorms<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Criteria for a tornado warning\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-glossary\/criteria-for-a-tornado-warning\">Criteria for a tornado warning<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Criteria for a severe thunderstorm warning\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/weather-glossary\/criteria-for-a-severe-thunderstorm-warning\">Criteria for a severe thunderstorm<\/a><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\"><a title=\"Difference between a flood and flash flood\" href=\"http:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/basic-meteorology\/what-is-the-difference-between-a-flash-flood-and-a-flood\/\">Difference between flood and flash flood<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/ialert.com\/services\/\">Sign-up to receive real-time tornado email and text message alerts<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The formation of a tornado can be broken down to three stages: 1) low level horizontal spin, 2) updraft tilting, and 3) vertical rotation. Stage 1 (Low Level Horizontal Spin) Before thunderstorms develop, winds change direction and increase in speed with altitude. This &hellip;<span class=\"more\"> <a href=\"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/basic-meteorology\/how-tornadoes-form\/\">Read More&#8230;<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":2472,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[189],"tags":[119,120],"class_list":["post-2468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basic-meteorology","tag-severe-weather","tag-tornado"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2468"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4626,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468\/revisions\/4626"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ialert.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}