Table of Contents
Where do winds come from in mid latitude areas?
Air circulation in the mid-latitudes is driven by pressures set up by circulation in the adjacent tropics and polar regions, and by the Coriolis effect. Surface winds within most of the mid-atitudes blow from west to east (westerlies), but the subtropics can have a relative lack of wind.
What winds are in the middle latitudes?
Prevailing Westerlies are the winds in the middle latitudes between 35 and 65 degrees latitude. They tend to blow from the high pressure area in the horse latitudes towards the poles. These prevailing winds blow from the west to the east steering extratropical cyclones in this general manner.
At which latitudes do surface winds converge?
These prevailing winds, known as the trade winds, meet at the Intertropical Convergence Zone (also called the doldrums) between 5 degrees North and 5 degrees South latitude, where the winds are calm.
What causes the mid latitude westerlies?
Within the belts of the westerly winds, cold easterly winds from polar regions meet the warm westerly winds of the middle latitudes, causing the formation of the traveling depressions characteristic of middle latitudes.
How are surface winds named?
Therefore, air flowing from the North Pole towards the equator produces cold, surface-level winds that blow from the northeast toward the southwest. Winds are named by the direction from which they blow.
At what latitude is the Coriolis effect strongest?
poles
12. As the latitude at which horizontally and freely moving objects are located decreases, the twisting of the underlying Earth’s surface due to the planet’s rotation decreases. That is, the Coriolis effect decreases as the latitude decreases. It is maximum at the poles and absent at the equator.
Where is mid latitude located?
The middle latitudes are a spatial region on Earth located between the latitudes 23°26’22” and 66°33’39” north, and 23°26’22” and 66°33’39” south. They include Earth’s subtropical and temperate zones, which lie between the tropics and the polar circles.