Supercell Signal Warns If Tornado Is On The Way

摘要

Tornado hunters may have a new ally - electricity.rnArmed with only an antenna and a receiver, Ernst Schmitter of the University of Applied Sciences at Osnabriick in Germany and John Leeman from the Leeman Webb Storm Laboratory in Norman, Oklahoma, picked up low-frequency electromagnetic waves in a rotating storm known as a "supercell". About 30 per cent of these storms spawn tornadoes.rnSchmitter and Leeman believe it is the supercell's swirling action that generates the signal. When dust particles and droplets within the storm rub againstrneach other, they become oppositely charged. The lighter particles, which are mostly negative, get blown to the top of the funnel, while the heavier, positive ones sink to the bottom.