cyclone

English

Cyclone Catarina, 2004.

Etymology

Coined by Henry Piddington, probably in the 1840s, and based on some term in Ancient Greek. Sources disagree on the date and on which Ancient Greek term, though it had to be something derived from either κύκλος (kúklos, “circle, wheel”) or κυκλόω (kuklóō, “go around in a circle, form a circle, encircle”), for example the present active participle κυκλῶν (kuklôn).

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈsaɪ.kloʊn/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈsaɪ.kləʊn/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

cyclone (plural cyclones)

1. A system of winds rotating around a center of low atmospheric pressure.
2. A low pressure system.
3. (informal) The more or less violent, small-scale circulations such as tornadoes, waterspouts, and dust devils.
4. A strong wind.
5. A Southeastern and Indian Ocean weather phenomenon that results in wind speeds of around 150 to 200 km/h.
6. A cyclone separator; the cylindrical vortex tube within such a separator

Quotations

• For usage examples of this term, see Citations:cyclone.

Derived terms

• anticyclone
• cyclone cellar
• cyclone pit

Translations

rotating system of winds

• Albanian: ciklon (sq)
• Arabic: إِعْصَار‏‎ m (ʾiʿṣār)
• Armenian: ցիկլոն (hy) (cʿiklon)
• Breton: kelc'hwidenn (br)
• Bulgarian: циклон (bg) m (ciklon)
• Catalan: cicló (ca) m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 氣旋 (zh), 气旋 (zh) (qìxuán), 龍捲風 (zh), 龙卷风 (zh) (lóngjuǎnfēng)

• Czech: cyklón (cs) m
• Danish: orkan (da)
• Dutch: cycloon (nl) m, wervelstorm (nl) m
• Esperanto: ciklono
• Estonian: tsüklon
• Finnish: matalapaine (fi)
• French: cyclone (fr) m
• German: Zyklon (de) m, Zyklone (de) f
• Greek:

  Ancient: κυκλῶν m (kuklôn)

  Modern: κυκλώνας (el) m (kyklónas)

• Gujarati: ચક્રવાત (cakravāt)
• Hebrew: ציקלון‏‎ (he) m (tziqlon)
• Hungarian: ciklon (hu)
• Interlingua: cyclon

• Italian: ciclone (it)
• Japanese: サイクロン (ja) (saikuron), 低気圧 (ja) (ていきあつ, teikiatsu)
• Latin: cyclonas
• Macedonian: циклон m (ciklon)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: syklon m

  Nynorsk: syklon m

• Persian: سیکلون‏‎ (siklon), چرخند‏‎ (fa) (čarxand)
• Portuguese: ciclone (pt) m
• Romanian: ciclon (ro) n
• Russian: цикло́н (ru) m (ciklón)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: циклон m, циклона f

  Roman: ciklon (sh) m, ciklona (sh) f

• Slovene: ciklon (sl) m
• Spanish: ciclón (es) m
• Swahili: saikloni m
• Swedish: cyklon (sv) c
• Tagalog: buhawi
• Telugu: తుఫాను (te) (tuphānu), గాలివాన (te) (gālivāna)
• Thai: ไซโคลน (th) (sai-kloon)
• Turkish: siklon (tr)

low pressure system

• Finnish: matalapaine

more or less violent, small-scale circulations of air

• Finnish: pyörremyrsky

strong wind

• Finnish: pyörremyrsky, myrsky

Southeastern and Indian Ocean weather phenomenon

• Finnish: trooppinen sykloni, sykloni
• French: cyclone (fr) m
• Greek: κυκλώνας (el) m (kyklónas)
• Gujarati: ચક્રવાત (cakravāt)
• Hindi: चक्रवात (hi) (cakravāt)

• Indonesian: siklon (id)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: syklon m

  Nynorsk: syklon m

• Swedish: cyklon (sv) c

cyclone separator — see cyclone separator

See also

• hurricane
• typhoon
• polar vortex
• cyclone on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

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French

Etymology

From Ancient Greek κυκλῶν (kuklôn), present active participle of κυκλόω (kuklóō, “I encircle”), from κύκλος (kúklos, “circle”)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /si.klon/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

cyclone m (plural cyclones)

1. cyclone (rotating system of winds)

Further reading

• “cyclone” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).