Anders Celsius

Both Celsius and Fahrenheit are temperature measurement systems developed by scientists in the 1700′s.  The Celsius system was credited to Anders Celsius, a Swedish astronomer, who invented a virtually identical system 2 years before his death. Celsius’ original measurements where simply reversed; 100 degrees Celsius, in his original system was the freezing point of water and 0 degrees was the boiling point. The term Centigrade was used interchangeably with Celsius: “Centi” meaning 100 and “grade” meaning steps and seemed to be a more apt description for this measurement system, but was officially changed to Celsius in 1948 to avoid confusion, as the term Centigrade is used by the Spanish and French as a unit of angular measurement.

The Fahrenheit scale was developed by Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit, a German physicist who based his scale on the work of Romer. Fahrenheit altered Romer’s scale by multiplying each standard Romer gradation (boiling and freezing) by 4. This allowed for larger numbers to be used, eliminating the need for fractional measurements.

The Celsius scale is by far the most widely used measure of temperature with a few exceptions; the United States and Belize still commonly use the Fahrenheit scale, although the worldwide scientific community, including in the US and Belize use the Celsius or Kelvin scale.

So; how do you convert Celsius to Fahrenheit and Fahrenheit to Celsius? Fahrenheit = (Celsius x 9/5) + 32 and Celsius = (Fahrenheit – 32) x 5/9

To make it easier to estimate; to convert Celsius to Fahrenheit, double and add 32 and to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius, subtract 32, then divide by 2. Thus; 100 degrees Fahrenheit is approximately 34 degrees Celsius. It is exactly 37.78 degrees Celsius. 15 degrees Celsius is approximately 62 degrees Fahrenheit. It is exactly 59 degrees Fahrenheit.

The biggest tornado in the world can be measured in a couple of different ways. I chose to go with the width of the tornado, as that is what I think of when I think of a big tornado. The widest meausred distance from one side to the other side was the Muhall Tornado (an F4 and at times an F5) in 1999 which measured 1600 meters across; but the winds surrounding the 1600 meters are also incredibly damaging, so the actual damage zone extended seven kilometers wide. The winds of this tornado were 110 meters per second. It was lucky that this tornado didn’t hit a major urban center, but very unlucky for the unfortunate residents of Muhall; most of their town was destroyed, save one building. The census in 2000 was 239 people. The Muhall Tornado was holds the record for the fastest wind velocity; winds are by no means uniform in all areas of a tornado, but one area within had a wind velocity of 134 meters per second.

Tornados are measured using the Fujita-Pearson Scale; that uses a rating system ranging from F 0(Zero) to F5, although when the scale was originally developed, there was a category F6, for a theoretical tornado that had not yet occurred. FZero causes minimal damages like tree branches breaking off and the winds range between 18 meters per second to to 32 meters per second. Category F1 can peel off roof surfaces and overturn mobile homes and the winds range from 33 meters per second to 50 metes per second. Category F2 can destroy mobile homes and uproot large trees. Winds range from 51 to 70 meters per second. Category F3 can rip walls and roofs off of sturdy houses, and hurl cars through the air. Winds range from 71 to 92 meters per second. F4 tornados completely level well constructed houses and will hurl whole houses through the air that aren’t properly anchored to their foundations. Winds range from 93 to 116 meters per second. An F5 tornado will lift well anchored houses right off their foundations, and carry them for 100′s of meters; totally demolishing them in the process. Large objects are picked up, such as cars and even bigger things, and become deadly projectiles. Winds range from 116 to 142 metes per second.