It’s officially Hurricane Season again in the United States. Just as they did last year, Google LatLong has announced the creation of a hurricane layer for Google Earth. You can access the layer under “weather” in Google Earth. As a part of that announcement from Google was a link to NOAA’s National Hurricane Center. On the National Hurricane Center website you can find information about currently developing storms as well as archived records of past storms.

Applications for Education
Using Google Earth to look at the path of hurricanes and other storms is one way to bring current news into the science classroom. The start of school coincides with hurricane season which presents teachers with a great opportunity to introduce students to the workings of Google Earth while teaching lessons about hurricanes and tropical storms.

Here are a couple of related resources that may be of interest to you:
Stop Disasters – Disaster Simulation Game
Hurricane Tracking Resources
Two Ways to Watch National Geographic Online