Science: The Benefits Of Hurricanes

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The process is only partly understood. Apparently formed when a low-pressure area develops over warm tropical waters, the newborn storm system is fed by evaporation from the sea. Helped by the whirling winds in the area (which move in a counterclockwise direction in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern), the rate of evaporation gradually increases. As the water vapor rises from the sea, it cools, condenses and releases enormous amounts of heat into the atmosphere. The heat, in turn, causes more evaporation and condensation, further fueling the brewing storm like the updraft in a chimney. As the winds build and the tropical storm edges away from its birthplace, it releases enormous stores of heat. In a full-fledged hurricane, which has winds of 75 m.p.h. or more, as much energy may be released in a single day as by the detonation of 400 20-megaton hydrogen bombs.

Warmer and Warmer. What would happen if man ever interfered drastically with this process? Meteorologist Francis K. Davis, who is dean of Drexel University's College of Science in Philadelphia, warns of some frightening consequences. Unable to shake off their heat, he says, the tropics might become warmer and warmer. Simultaneously, the polar regions would slowly become colder. Eventually, both areas would expand, relentlessly shrinking the thickly populated temperate zones between them.

Davis foresees another possible horror. If they were prevented by man's technology from releasing their heat through tropical storms, the equatorial seas might warm up until their huge store of heat would be released in the form of super hurricanes that could make their present-day counterparts seem as mild as a summer downpour.

Davis acknowledges that his terrifying scenarios are based on a large quotient of guesswork. Meteorologists may not ever achieve enough mastery over hurricanes to affect the earth's heat balance. Still, the warning echoes a theme that is finding widening support among thoughtful scientists: man must learn much more about nature's most elemental forces before he tampers with them.