Talk:Waterspout
I think a waterspout is considered a separate type of storm from a tornado. Tornados that form over water aren't necessarily waterspouts.
Clarification: Waterspouts are NOT Tornadoes over water
The Encyclopædia Britannica clarifies the distinction between tornadoes and waterspouts. I quote:
"There is much confusion in classifying waterspouts. For many years, they were called tornadoes over water, a definition still in wide use. However, as tornado researchers have learned more about atmospheric vortices, it has become clear that several mechanisms can give rise to a strong vortex pendant from a cloud...Most waterspouts closely resemble weak tornadoes, some of which are called landspouts because of this similarity. The rotation occurs at low levels in the atmosphere, so the resulting vortex does not extend very far up into the cloud. Indeed, the rotation is not often detectable by radar, another indication that waterspouts are a phenomenon largely confined to the region below cloud base..."
Also of note:
"On the Fujita Scale of tornado intensity, most waterspouts would thus rate as F0. That is, almost all waterspouts have intensities similar that those of weak tornadoes."
It may be concluded that, while waterspouts are largely comparable to very weak tornadoes, they are an anomaly of nature, attributable to the deviation in the mechanism of their formation.
I hope this will serve to allay what might at times have been a very intense and personal debate as to the true definition of the waterspout.
-- X444 22:22, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
Waterspout references
According to the National Weather Service FAQ on tornadoes at [1], a waterspout is a tornado. Does anyone know of other authoritative references about waterspouts that state otherwise? If so, they need to be listed in accordance with Wikipedia:Verifiability policy.
- I have heard of no source ever claiming that a waterspout is anything other than a tornado over water. -- Cyrius|✎ 03:19, 28 May 2005 (UTC)
Waterspouts are tornadoes over water
Extract from www.torro.org.uk:
"Some tornadoes form out to sea as strong waterspouts (q.v.) which sometimes cross the coast, so a waterspout may become a tornado as the twisting funnel moves from land to sea (and vice-versa). A recent powerful and well-documented example is that of Selsey on the south coast of England on the night of 7 to 8 January 1998. When the waterspout made landfall, it carved a trail of damage a kilometer wide through the town as it damaged hundreds of buildings in less than ten minutes"
Also, and extract from http://www.nssl.noaa.gov/NWSTornado/
"Waterspouts occasionally move inland becoming tornadoes causing damage and injuries."
Cleanup required
Following today's extensive edits by User:65.77.67.15 - diff, we now need a bit of clean up. The edits mostly look good, but
- The significant changes to Waterspout vs Tornado definitions need confirmation or sourcing
- we've lost the original references
- lead para needs reformatting to conform with the Manual of Sytle
- self references to Wikipedia need to be removed
Content
Does the following text really belong in the main article? "For some reason, the flap surrounding this "waterspouts are tornadoes" debate seems to have been caused by the effort by the National Weather Service to reduce confusion; the NWS uses a definition of waterspout that states that waterspouts are indeed tornadoes so that the public doesn't endanger itself attempting to second-guess the issuance of tornado warnings. Unfortunately, this flap has extended to Wikipedia via believers of both philosophies continuing to fight it out via constantly changing the content of this section of the Tornado article and the Waterspout article to reflect their personal beliefs instead supporting reality."''
I'm not sure.
I, myself made the edits about waterspouts vs tornadoes issue being just a matter of definition.
Just for the record, I am not confused by the NWS's definitions, as I am UK based and made my edits based mostly on UK sources (www.torro.org.uk)
I have never seen any of my sources say anything other than waterspouts are merely tornadoes over water. I have clearly stated my sources as above. I would really like User:65.77.67.15 to show me sources that state that I am incorrect.
Extract from www.torro.org.uk:
"Some tornadoes form out to sea as strong waterspouts (q.v.) which sometimes cross the coast, so a waterspout may become a tornado as the twisting funnel moves from land to sea (and vice-versa). A recent powerful and well-documented example is that of Selsey on the south coast of England on the night of 7 to 8 January 1998. When the waterspout made landfall, it carved a trail of damage a kilometer wide through the town as it damaged hundreds of buildings in less than ten minutes"
Also, and extract from http://www.nssl.noaa.gov/NWSTornado/
"Waterspouts occasionally move inland becoming tornadoes causing damage and injuries."
- That in part is what I was talking about in 'Needs cleanup' above. If the change in definition isn't supported, it is quite possible that all the recent edits by User:65.77.67.15 should be reverted. At the least, the self-references to Wikipedia should be removed. -- Solipsist 14:26, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
- I've been doing some futher research and reading. In a nutshell landspouts and most waterspouts are examples of non-supercell tornadoes, however they are still tornadoes.
- Here in the UK, we refer to all such votexes that make ground contact over land "tornadoes", and any that make ground contact over water "waterspouts". Most UK tornadoes are not supercell tornadoes, but they are still refered to as tornadoes.
- I think that first of all my edits should be reverted and then both this article and main tornado article should be edited to state that there is more than one type of tornado (landspout, gustnado, supercell, waterspout) --Weirdgeordie 23:17, 18 November 2005 (UTC)