The nature of wind storms and wind-induced damage

Wind loading competes with seismic loading as the dominant environmental loading for structures. They have produced roughly equal amounts of damage over a long time period, although large damaging earthquakes occur less often than severe wind storms. On almost every day of the year a severe wind storm is happening somewhere on the earth-although many storms are small and localized. In the tropical oceans, the most severe of all wind events-tropical cyclones (including hurricanes and typhoons)—are generated. When these storms make landfall on populated coastlines, their effects can be devastating.