Storms Forecast for Chicago Museum

Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry on March 18 unveils Science Storms, a new permanent exhibit that reveals the science behind some of nature’s most powerful phenomena—tornadoes, lightning, fire, tsunamis, sunlight, avalanches and atoms in motion.

Inside the 24,000-square-foot exhibit, guests can immerse themselves in a 40-foot tornado to experiment with air pressure and wind speed inside a towering vortex of vapor; create a high-voltage lightning storm by discharging volts of energy from a giant Tesla coil to discover electricity and magnetism; trigger a 20-foot avalanche to reveal the beauty of granular dynamics; and discover the power and motion of waves by unleashing a tsunami across a 30-foot wave tank.

The exhibit is part of an overall plan by the Museum of Science and Industry to change or update nearly 90 percent of its exhibit space by 2011.

www.msichicago.org