WebQuest: Extreme Weather

Weather on Earth is amazing. You'll find two-hundred mile-per-hour winds and triple-digit temperatures, plus and minus. How could all this happen on the same day? There are lots of reasons, but one of the main ones is that winter and summer occur simultaneously, each in one hemisphere: When it's summer in New York, it's winter in Sydney. These extremes in temperature are astonishing! Let's find out just where the hottest, coldest, windiest, driest and wettest places are on Earth. Click on the links below to get started.


  1. Where's the hottest place on Earth? What's the hottest temperature ever recorded?
    Sometimes the answers to questions like these are not certain. There are two places normally considered to be the hottest on Earth. One is in Africa, and the other one is in the United States. Do you know what the hottest place in the United States is?


  2. What's the coldest place on Earth? What's the coldest temperature ever recorded?

    Put on your parka and check out this live webcam from one of the coldest places on Earth!
    http://www.cmdl.noaa.gov/obop/spo/livecamera.html

  3. On average, what's considered to be the windiest place in the world? Not counting tornadoes, what's the highest surface wind speed ever recorded on Earth, and where did it occur?

  4. What's the wettest place on Earth?
    Sometimes, experts differ in their answer to this question, too.


  5. What's the driest place on Earth?
    It would take a century of rainfall here to fill a cup of water!


  6. What are the hottest and coldest places in the world right now?

    • http://www.wx-now.com
      Scroll down and click on "U.S." or "Worldwide," and then on "coldest" or "hottest" to find your answer. Look at the graphic to see if it's day or night at that location.

    • http://www.weathermatrix.net
      (Continental U.S. only)