I’m looking at the GOES-East for the Gulf of Mexico and I began to noctice something that intruiged me. The outter edges of the storm appear to flair outward clockwise. I understand the coriolis effect but that explains the rotation of a hurricane in the northern hemisphere as a whole. My question is, why do the edges and tops of the hurricane appear to spin clockwise, agaist the storm, as if the storm is under a high pressure? TIA!
In: Planetary Science
Because a hurricane can not hold onto a “single cloud” indefinitely; bits are always being expelled from the main storm structure.
As things are expelled they have different momentum and can then appear to be moving opposite the storm; or in fact other winds or pressure move the cloud in opposite direction
We can see this on a normal day where lower clouds move in a different direction than higher clounds
Tropical systems suck in air towards the center and all that air has to go somewhere. Where it goes is up higher into the atmosphere and out away from the storm in what is called [outflow](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outflow_(meteorology)#Tropical_cyclones). I’m pretty sure that is what you’re talking about.
The equator is the farthest you can be from Earth’s axis of rotation. The poles being the closest. It takes more energy to spin something that’s farther from the axis. The half of the hurricane nearest the equator has more work to do, so it spins slower.
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