Question

Alka was making tea in a kettle. Suddenly she felt intense heat from the
puff of steam gushing out of the spout of the kettle. She wondered then the
temperature of the steam was higher than that of the water boiling in the
vessel. Comment.

Answer 1

The boiling point of water is 100°C. The temperature of boiling water does not rise instead of continuous supply of heat, as the extra heat is supplied to the water is used to turn water into steam. Hence, steam has a lot of latent heat which can cause severe burn. That’s why Alka felt intense heat from the puff of steam gushing out of the spout of the kettle.