Department of Energy Argonne National Laboratory Office of Science NEWTON's Homepage NEWTON's Homepage
NEWTON, Ask A Scientist!
NEWTON Home Page NEWTON Teachers Visit Our Archives Ask A Question How To Ask A Question Question of the Week Our Expert Scientists Volunteer at NEWTON! Frequently Asked Questions Referencing NEWTON About NEWTON About Ask A Scientist Education At Argonne Most Windless Place 
Name: Alexander
Status: N/A
Age: 18
Location: N/A
Country: N/A
Date: 2001-2002
Question:
Where is the most windless place on the earth?

Replies:
Dear Alexander-

It might depend on how you define windless. And I am not sure records are kept for this purpose. If you define most windless as the location with the most hours of calm winds, that would be different from a location with the lowest annual average wind speed.

Some likely candidates for most windless would be land locations near the equator, where the surface pressure gradient is very weak, and large forests and vegetation would inhibit air movement. Other candidate locations would be in the center of large high pressure areas over oceans in the tropics, where winds are light and variable for days and weeks at a time.

Wendell Bechtold, meteorologist
Forecaster, National Weather Service
Weather Forecast Office, St. Louis, MO

Click here to return to the Weather Archives

NEWTON is an electronic community for Science, Math, and Computer Science K-12 Educators, sponsored and operated by Argonne National Laboratory's Educational Programs, Andrew Skipor, Ph.D., Head of Educational Programs.

For assistance with NEWTON contact a System Operator (help@newton.dep.anl.gov), or at Argonne's Educational Programs

NEWTON AND ASK A SCIENTIST
Educational Programs
Building 360
9700 S. Cass Ave.
Argonne, Illinois
60439-4845, USA
Update: June 2012
Weclome To Newton

Argonne National Laboratory