Definition of "swirling"

When the right-away was given, Driver Gibson would give a sonorous blast on Cardean's deep-toned hooter, and amid a flurry of swirling steam the train would move majestically out, with nearly half the city of Carlisle—or so it would appear—as onlookers on the platform.

1945 May and June, Cecil J. Allen, “British Locomotive Practice and Performance”, in Railway Magazine, page 152