F.Y.I.

Do you know the difference between a hurricane, a typhoon and a cyclone? Honolulu Community College Professor Richard Brill does.

The Caribbean Sea is the spawning ground for hurricanes in the Atlantic and eastern Pacific Oceans. They are called typhoons In the western Pacific and cyclones in the Indian Ocean, but the physics is the same.

A cyclone is any mass of air that spirals around a low pressure center. It is an organized collection of thunderstorms embedded in a swirling mass of air.

At the center of the spiral is the eye, a vertical tube of clear skies and calm winds; the more intense the storm, the smaller the eye.

Although the main upwards flow of air is around the eye, the entire air mass is unstable. Spiraling rows of thunderstorms with relatively clear areas between them extend outwards for up to two thousand miles from the center, gradually diminishing in intensity.