Meteorologist Tiffany Savona:The wind affects the feels-like temperatures during the winter and the summer, but strong winds are more noticeable in the winter months, while high humidity is more noticeable in the summer months. Here's why.
The National Weather Service defines the term wind chill as "how cold people and animals feel when outside. Wind chill is based on the rate of heat loss from exposed skin caused by wind and cold."
When it's cold outside, your body generates a warm layer of air around your skin. As the wind increases, it disrupts this layer, exposing your skin to the colder weather, which eventually drops your body temperature. This is why itfeelsmuch colder when it is cold and windy outside. Cold air is also much drier than warmer air, so humidity doesn't play a factor during the wintertime.
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Let's talk about the heat index. A warm summer breeze just doesn't have the same effect on the body compared to a frigid winter wind. Yes, the wind can help cool you off, which is how fans work, but it's more about the relative humidity and feels-like temperatures. Heat index is a measure of how hot it feels when the relative humidity is factored into the actual air temperature.
Bottom line is that sweating is how your body cools itself. Your body starts to sweat when you get too hot. Then the sweat begins to evaporate, which is a cooling process. When there is a lot of moisture in the air and the relative humidity is high, it becomes harder for the sweat to evaporate from your body. So you begin to feel even hotter.
The wind chill and heat index charts were created to give ranges when weather conditions can become too dangerous to be outside. Keep in mind that the actual air temperature is taken in the shade, so the sun can actually make it feel even more uncomfortable on those hot and humid summer days.
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