Maritza De La Luz

Category One: Winds from 119 to 153 km (74 to 95 mi.) per hour. No damage to building structures. Some damage to construction signs. Hurricane Irene of ‘99 and Katrina were Category 1 when they made land fall. Category Two: Winds from 154 to 177 (96 to 110 mi) per hour. Some roofing material, door, and window damage of buildings. Considerable damage to shrubbery and trees. Hurricane Isabel of 2003 and Frances of 2004 were Cat. 2 when they made landfall in North Carolina and Florida. Category Three: 179 to 209 (111 to 130 mi) per hour. Some structure damage to small residences and utility buildings with a minor amount of wall failures. Mobile homes and constructed signs are destroyed. Flooding near the coast destroys smaller structures. Hurricane Ivan and Jeanne of 2004 were Category 3 when they made landfall along Alabama and Florida.

Category 4: Winds up to 210 to 249 (131 to 155 mi) per hour. More extensive wall failures with come complete roof structure failures on small residence. Shrubs, trees, and all signs are blown down. Extensive damage to doors and windows. Hurricane Charley or 2004 and Dennis of 2005 were Category 5 when they struck the coasts of Florida and Cuba. Category 5: Winds greater than 249 km. (155 mi) per hour. Complete roof failure on many residences and industrial buildings. All shrubs, trees, and signs blown down. Complete destruction of mobile homes. Massive evacuation of residential areas on low ground within 8 to 16 km of the shoreline may be required. Hurricanes Camille(1969), Andrew(1992), Wilma(2005) were Category 5.

Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005 and caused floodings. The levees and floodwalls were overtopped and breached by the storm surge. Hurricane Katrina was the most expensive natural disaster in history.

An estimated 1.2 million people were evacuated from the affected area, and more the 400,000 people ended up in public shelters in 18 states. Katrina destroyed more than 300,000 homes in four states.

In meteorological terms, Hurricane Katrina was a cyclone, a center of low atmospheric pressure characterized by rotating winds. In the Northern Hemisphere are deflected to the right and blow in a counterclockwise rotation around the low-pressure center. Multiple cyclones in the Indian Ocean

Most hurricanes start out as a tropical disturbance. A tropical disturbance may become a tropical depression if winds increase and spiral around the area of disturbed weather to form a low-pressure center. When wind speeds increase to 63 km per hour, the depression is upgraded to a tropical storm and receives a name. The winds are not as strong as in a hurricane, their rainfall amounts can be as intense.

Cyclones are closely linked to coastal erosion, floodings, mass wasting, and other types of severe weather, such as tornadoes, severe thunderstorms, snowstorms, and blizzards. In coastal areas, the cyclone hazard is directly linked to climate change.

Human interaction with cyclones has increased markedly in the past four decades. In the past 50 years, population in the U.S. has been greatest in coastal areas. Today, more than 53% of people in the U.S. live in coastal counties.

Hurricanes can be difficult to forecast because the encompass many different weather processes. They are unpredictable because once a hurricane has formed, meteorologist must predict if it will reach land, when and where it will strike, how strong the winds will be, and how much rainfall will accompany the storm.

Cyclone in Australia