Florida, FL

The State of Florida is located in the southeastern region of the United States. Most of the state is a large peninsula with the Gulf of Mexico on its west and the Atlantic Ocean on its east.

Much of the state has a humid subtropical climate, except for southern Florida, where the climate is tropical.

Florida was named by Juan Ponce de León, who landed on the peninsula on 2 April 1513, during Pascua Florida (Spanish for "Flowery Easter," referring to the Easter season).

Florida is the 4th most populated state in the country. It ranks 4th in population only behind New York(3rd), Texas(2nd), and California (most).

Geography

Florida is situated mostly on a large peninsula between the Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic Ocean, and the Straits of Florida. It extends to the northwest into a panhandle, extending along the northern Gulf of Mexico.

It is bordered on the north by the states of Georgia and Alabama, and on the west, at the end of the panhandle, by Alabama. It is near the countries of the Caribbean, particularly the Bahamas and Cuba.

Florida's extensive coast line made it a perceived target during World War II, so the government built airstrips all around the state.

Today approximately 400 airports are still in service due to the coastal geography of the state. According to the National Drug Intelligence Center, Florida has 131 public airports, and more than 700 private airports, airstrips, heliports, and seaplane bases.

Florida is one of the largest states east of the Mississippi. Only Alaska and Michigan are larger in water area. The Florida peninsula is a porous plateau of karst limestone sitting atop bedrock.

Extended systems of underwater caves, sinkholes and springs are found throughout the state and supply most of the water used by residents.

The limestone is topped with sandy soils deposited as ancient beaches over millions of years as global sea levels rose and fell. During the last Ice Age, lower sea levels and a drier climate revealed a much wider peninsula, largely desert.

At the southern end of the peninsula, the Everglades are in fact an enormously wide, very slow-flowing river. At 345 feet (105 m) above mean sea level, Britton Hill is the highest point in Florida and the lowest highpoint of any U.S. state.

Contrary to popular belief, however, Florida is not entirely "flat." Some places, such as Clearwater, feature vistas that rise 50 to 100 feet (15 – 30 m) above the water.

Much of the interior of Florida, typically 25 miles (40 km) or more away from the coastline, features hills with elevations ranging from 100 to 250 feet (30 – 76 m) in many locations.

Lake County holds the highest point of peninsular Florida, Sugarloaf Mountain, at 312 feet (95 m).

Climate

The climate of Florida is tempered somewhat by its proximity to water. Most of the state has a humid subtropical climate, except for the southern part below Lake Okeechobee which has a true tropical climate.

Cold fronts can occasionally bring high winds and cool to cold temperatures to the entire state during late fall and winter. One such front swept through the peninsula on November 25, 1996, bringing cold temperatures and winds up to 95 miles per hour (150 km/h), knocking out power to thousands and damaging mobile homes.

The seasons in Florida are actually determined more by precipitation than by temperature with mild to cool, relatively dry winters and autumns (the dry season) and hot, wet springs and summers (the wet season).

The Gulf Stream has a moderating effect on the climate, and although much of Florida commonly sees a high summer temperature over 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32 °C), the mercury seldom exceeds 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 °C). The hottest temperature ever recorded in the state was 109 °F (43 °C), set on June 29, 1931 in Monticello. The coldest was – 2 °F (−19 °C), on February 13, 1899, just 25 miles (40 km) away, in Tallahassee.

Mean high temperatures for late July are primarily in the low 90s Fahrenheit (32 – 35 °C). Mean low temperatures for late January range from the low 40s Fahrenheit (4 – 7 °C) in northern Florida to the mid-50s (≈13 °C) in southern Florida.

The Florida Keys, being surrounded by water, have a more tropical climate, with lesser variability in temperatures. At Key West, temperatures rarely exceed 90 °F in the summer or fall below 60 °F in the winter, and frost has never been reported in the Keys. Florida's nickname is the "Sunshine State", but severe weather is a common occurrence in the state.

Central Florida is known as the lightning capital of the United States, as it experiences more lightning strikes than anywhere else in the country. Florida has the highest average precipitation of any state, in large part because afternoon thunderstorms are common in most of the state from late spring until early autumn. A fair day may be interrupted with a storm, only to return to sunshine.

These thunderstorms, caused by collisions between airflow from the Gulf of Mexico and airflow from the Atlantic Ocean, pop up in the early afternoon and can bring heavy downpours, high winds, and sometimes tornadoes. Florida leads the United States in tornadoes per square mile, but these tornadoes do not typically reach the intensity of those in the Midwest and Great Plains.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Florida".