This MedLibrary.org supplementary page on Foehn wind is provided directly from the open source Wikipedia as a service to our readers. Please see the note below on authorship of this content, as well as the Wikipedia usage guidelines. To search for other content from our encyclopedia supplement, please use the form below:
Related Sponsors
A foehn wind or föhn wind is a type of dry down slope wind which occurs in the lee of a mountain range. It is a rain shadow wind which results from the subsequent adiabatic warming of air which has dropped most of its moisture on windward slopes (see orographic lift). As a consequence of the different adiabatic lapse rates of moist and dry air, the air on the leeward slopes becomes warmer than equivalent elevations on the windward slopes. Föhn winds can raise temperatures by as much as 30°C (54°F) in just a matter of hours. Central Europe enjoys a warmer climate due to the Föhn.
Contents |
Effects
Winds of this type are called "snow-eaters" for their ability to make snow melt (also sublimate) rapidly. This snow-removing ability is caused not only by warmer temperatures, but also the low relative humidity of the air mass, having been stripped of moisture by orographic precipitation coming over the mountain(s).
Föhn winds are notorious among mountaineers in the Alps, especially those climbing the Eiger, for whom the winds add additional difficulty in ascending an already difficult peak.
They are also associated with the rapid spread of wildfires, making some regions which experience these winds particularly fire-prone.
These winds are often associated with illness ranging from migraines to psychosis. A study by the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München found that suicide and accidents increased by 10 percent during föhn winds in Central Europe. The causation of Föhnkrankheit (English: Föhn-sickness) is yet unproven. Labelling for preparations of aspirin combined with caffeine, codeine and the like will sometimes include Föhnkrankheit amongst the indications.
Etymology
The name föhn (from the German Föhn, pronounced [ˈføːn]) originated in the alpine region. From Latin (ventus) favonius, a mild west wind of which Favonius was the Roman personification.1
Local examples
Regionally, these winds are known by many different names. These include:
- Zonda winds in Argentina
- Chinook winds in the Rocky Mountains, United States/Canada and the Chugach Mountains of Alaska, United States
- The Nor'wester in Hawkes Bay, Canterbury and Otago, New Zealand
- Föhn in Wollongong and South Coast, NSW Australia. Often associated with heavy orographic lifiting on the windward side of the escarpment
- Halny in the Carpathian Mountains, Eastern Europe
- Fogony in the Catalan Pyrenees
- Bergwind in South Africa
- Viento del Sur (Southern Wind) in the Cantabrian region (northern Spain)
- Terral in Málaga (southern Spain)
- Föhn in Austria, southern Germany, German-speaking regions of Switzerland and Northern Italy (even non German-speaking regions)
- Favonio in Ticino and Italy
- The Helm wind, on the Pennines in the Eden Valley, Cumbria, England
The Santa Ana winds of southern California are in some ways similar to the Föhn, but originate in dry deserts rather than from precipitation.
In Popular Culture
- Peter Camenzind, a novel by Hermann Hesse refers, at length, to the Alpine Föhn.
- The Föhn is used for the letter F in "Crazy ABC's" from the album Snacktime! by the Barenaked Ladies.
- The threat of the Föhn drives the protaganists Ayla and Jondalar in Jean M. Auel's The Plains Of Passage over a glacier before the spring melt. The pair make references to the mood altering phenomena of the wind, similar to those of the Santa Ana wind.
Fön trademark
AEG registered the trademark Fön in the 1920s for its hairdryer, which is widely used as a synonym in several languages, such as German, Swiss German, Danish, Italian, Dutch, Norwegian, Czech, Croatian, Latvian, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Swedish, Turkish and French in western Switzerland.
See also
References
- McKnight, TL & Hess, Darrel (2000). Foehn/Chinoonk Winds. In , Physical Geography: A Landscape Appreciation, pp. 132. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. ISBN 0130202630
Footnotes
- ^ Concise Oxford Dictionary, 10th edition, Oxford University Press, entry föhn.
External links
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 3 December 2008, at 13:55.
Wikipedia Authorship and Review
Wikipedia content provided here is not reviewed directly by MedLibrary.org. Wikipedia content is authored by an open community of volunteers and is not produced by or in any way affiliated with MedLibrary.org.
Wikipedia Usage Guidelines
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article on "Foehn wind".
The URL for this specific entry is:
All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details). Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.