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Hurricane Camille, one of the few hurricanes to hit U.S. shores at Category 5 strength, pummeled the Mississippi coastline in August of 1969. See more pictures of storms.
Storms are one of those incredible forces of nature that can change life in a single instant, but just how do we measure how destructive a storm is? Is it by the number of lives lost? Its lasting impact on a population? The financial costs of the destruction? Most violent storms produce a terrible and terrifying combination of all three -- the overall effects often leave people stunned and devastated that so much chaos could happen on the whim of weather.
Before we talk about the five big ones, let's get a little more familiar with the naming traditions of storms. All circling weather patterns with low-pressure centers technically are called cyclones. So hurricanes and tornadoes fall under the cyclone designation, but the term can be used to denote anything in the category that fits the definition. For example, middle-latitude (or midlatitude) cyclones, huge weather systems of varying strengths, are also in this category.
Remember, the term "hurricane" is used for a storm that begins east of the international date line. This type of storm is called a typhoon if it's spawned to the west. If you're in the Indian Ocean, you call this same storm a cyclone.
Also, knowing how scientists rate the strength of storms will help you understand the potential destruction they can cause. The Enhanced Fujita (EF) Tornado Scale and the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale categorize tornadoes and hurricanes based on wind speeds and the damage this wind causes. In both scales, the higher the number, the worse the storm. Read about each scale and its corresponding categories in How Tornadoes Work and How Hurricanes Work.
In this article, we'll look at a couple of storms that topped the charts in destruction and death toll. Continue to the next page to begin our journey into the eye of the storm.
