Dear Tom,
Do you know of any interesting misunderstandings people have about the weather?
Paul Laughlin, University of Notre Dame
Dear Paul,
Here are a few widely-held but absolutely incorrect beliefs:
A highway underpass is a good place to take shelter from a tornado; tornadoes strike mobile homes more often; getting chilled can cause a cold; Eskimos have a multitude of words (50 or more) for snow; it can be too cold to snow; the Earth is farther from the sun in winter, closer in summer; hurricanes contain raging thunderstorms; it rains/snows more on weekends than on weekdays; tornadoes skip up and down as they move along; tornadoes cannot occur in Chicago’s Loop; the image of the moon is larger near the horizon; raindrops are shaped like teardrops; moist air is heavier than dry air.
———-
Tom Skilling is chief meteorologist at WGN-TV. His forecasts can be seen Monday through Friday on WGN-TV News at noon and 9 p.m.
WGN-TV meteorologists Steve Kahn, Richard Koeneman and Paul Dailey plus weather producer Bill Snyder contribute to this page.
