Thursday Thirteen Storms

Welcome to my Thursday Thirteen post!  It's been raining here, or should I say storming, for two days now.  Here are some fun facts about rainstorms.

1.  In 1703, the Great Storm in England killed about 8,000 people.  It also destroyed windmills and chimneys.

2.  While earthquakes are measured with the Richter scale, storms are measure with the Beaufort scale.

3.  Rain and thunder reach the classification of storm when winds are between 55 and 63 mph.  The next category is violent storm (64-73 mph).  Winds are 74 mph are considered hurricanes.

4.  In 1974, there was a storm with a blast of cold air that froze ducks, and the frozen ducks fell from the sky onto people.  No lie!

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5.  There are about 2,000 storms happening all over the world at any given time.  (A different source said 1800.)
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6.  In 1967, a hurricane in my home state of Texas spawned 115 tornadoes.

7.  Rain is good for you!  It contains vitamin B12.

8.  The scales on a pinecone will close when rain is on the way.
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9.  The least rainy place on Earth is Antarctica.  It only gets 6.5 inches of rain per year.

10.  Llora, Columbia gets the most rainfall each year at 534 inches.

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11.  Two types of clouds indicate rain is on the way:  cumulonimbus, which are tall, puffy, and flat on top, and nimbostratus, which are flat, low-level, and gray.
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12.  Raindrops fall at a rate of 7-18 mph but can go faster when it is windy.

13.  Doppler radar is used to measure the direction and speed of precipitation.  It is named for an Austrian physicist named J. Christopher Doppler.  He came up with the theory to explain why a whistle train sounds higher when it is approaching rather than when it is moving away.

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