Study Questions for Assignment 2 | Earth Science: Weather and Climate | GEOG 1110, Study notes of Climatology

Download Study Questions for Assignment 2 | Earth Science: Weather and Climate | GEOG 1110 and more Study notes Climatology in PDF only on Docsity! GEOG1110 Assignment 2 Instructions: 1. Work on these questions each week, as you complete the readings and quizzes for each chapter. 2. Answer ALL questions. 3. Submit your completed assignment to the ‘Assignment 2 drop box’ on or before the due date. 4. Late assignments will be assessed a 20% late penalty, and late assignments will not be accepted more than 72hrs (3 days) beyond the due date without a doctor’s excuse. NOTES: 1. All answers must be in your own words. Do not copy from the textbook (this is plagiarism unless you use quotation marks and reference your source). Please see the syllabus for details on the plagiarism policy for this course. 2. To turn in an electronic sketch, you have several options -- sketch by hand and scan it, sketch by hand and take a digital picture of it, sketch using a drawing program like Paint (found under accessories in all Windows computers). Chapter 5 questions 1. a) Summarize the four major controls on temperature. a) Study the two Global mean temperature maps in your text (one for January and one for July). Apply what you know about the four major controls to explain the seasonal pattern. Note: You may find the Animations CD helpful – see the section “Global Surface Temps, Land and Ocean found in Chapter 5. 2. Study the Global Temperature Range map in your text. a) Where is the annual temperature range the largest? Where is it the smallest? b) Explain this pattern, relating it to the four major controls on temperature. Two of the patterns you should explain are the effect of the Gulf Stream (figure 5-10) on Great Britain and Iceland, also the difference in temperature range in the southern hemisphere compared to the northern hemisphere. 3. The thermal equator is a line that connects the dots between the maximum temperature at each meridian of longitude. a) Explain its seasonal pattern of migration b) Explain why it behaves differently over land than over water. Note: Use what you learned in Chapter 2 and what you learned in this chapter regarding temperature controls. Chapter 6 questions 4. Air pressure a) Explain air pressure in layman’s terms (i.e. in your own words without using technical jargon) b) Do a web search to find the lowest air pressure associated with ten hurricanes/typhoons/cyclones, and their rating on the Saffir-Simpson scale. Develop a hypothesis relating air pressure to hurricane strength, and use the data you have gathered to explain how you came up with your hypothesis. 5. The jet stream. a) Use your own words to describe how the position of the jet stream influences surface weather in North America. b) Research jet stream-related weather events. Choose one and summarize it. Your goal here is to provide a concrete example of one instance where the jet stream has influenced our weather. c) A flight from Montreal, Canada to London, England takes approximately five and one half hours, yet a flight from London, England to Montreal, Canada takes approximately six and one half hours. Explain this difference. 6. Choose either The Asiatic Monsoon or the Santa Ana winds and answer the following questions: a) Describe this phenomenon – what it is, and the weather associated with it b) Explain its driving force in terms of atmospheric pressure and wind Hint: you will also want to look ahead to the first part of Chapter 8 concerning air masses and lifting mechanisms) 7. Compare the wind belts in Fig 6.12 with the ocean currents in Fig 6.21. One of the major driving forces for ocean currents is wind. a) Describe the evidence you see in these figures to support this theory. b) Explain the connection between ocean circulation and El Niño Southern Oscillation. Chapter 7 Questions 8. Relative humidity is the ratio of the air’s water vapor content divided by its water vapor capacity, and it ranges from 0 to 100% (FYI - on very rare occasions air may become super-saturated and humidity may exceed 100%). Fill in the following table (the first one is done for you, ignore the grey cells): Vapor pressure Saturation vapor pressure Specific humidity Maximum specific humidity Relative humidity Temperature 10.2 mb 17 mb XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX 60% 15 °C 15 mb XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX 60%