Labs / Geography
Global Wind Belts
Sun-driven convection stacks three cells — Hadley, Ferrel & Polar — into each hemisphere, and Earth's spin twists the surface flow into the named wind belts. Slide your cursor down the map to read the wind at any latitude, then change the planet's spin and how hard the sun heats it.
Lat 20°NBelt Trade WindsWind from NEDeflection 0°
What to try
- Drag the spin down to zero. Where do the curving trade winds and westerlies go, and why do they collapse into straight north–south flow?
- Park your cursor at 15°N, then at 45°N. Why does one belt blow "from the NE" while the other blows "from the SW"?
- Watch the deflection readout as you move from the equator to the pole. Where is the Coriolis bending strongest, and where does it vanish?
- Turn the heating down with "Weak sun." What happens to the wind speeds and to the parcels drifting near the doldrums?
- Why are the calm belts — the doldrums at 0° and the horse latitudes near 30° — exactly where two neighbouring cells meet?