The purpose of this web page is to give a colorful and comprehensible overview of Florida's hurricanes, past and present. Hurricanes are also known as typhoons or cyclones, depending on which region of the world the storm is in.
Hurricanes are storms that originate when heat builds up in tropical areas.
In order for hurricanes to form, ocean water must be very warm, the air must be warm and very moist, and upper-level winds must be weak. When winds and thunderstorms converge in low-pressure zones, they rotate in a counterclockwise direction to form a wind system whose wind speeds increase until the system becomes a hurricane. Florida's hurricanes are Atlantic storm systems that generally develop near the Cape Verde islands off of the west coast of Africa. The Cape Verde Islands are located near an equatorial trough which provides the warm, humid conditions that hurricanes initially require. After the storms form near Africa, easterly trade winds and easterly waves carry the storms over the Atlantic Ocean towards North America and the Caribbean.