This map shows a global three-day average of wind speeds over the world's oceans, as measured by the NASA Scatterometer onboard Japan's Advanced Earth Observing Satellite. The uncalibrated data were taken from September 20 to 22, 1996. The color indicates wind speed, with purple and blue being low winds, green to yellow as moderate winds, and orange to red as high winds. Typhoons Violet and Tom are shown as yellow-orange spirals near Japan. The usual high level of winter storm activity is also shown in yellow in the southern hemisphere near Antarctica in an area sailors refer to as "the roaring forties." NSCAT wind measurements cover 90 percent of the ocean surface each day, achieving nearly 100 percent coverage within three days. NSCAT provides continuous measurements of ocean surface wind speeds from space, which will help meteorologists better predict the behavior of storms. Data like these are being used by the National Weather Service, an agency of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in their global forecast models. NSCAT was launched August 16, 1996. The mission represents the first major collaboration in Earth remote sensing between the two nations. JPL developed, built and manages the NSCAT instrument for NASA's Mission to Planet Earth program. This "first look" image is still uncalibrated, but images like this will be routinely available after completion of the calibration validation phase on the project's World Wide Web site at http://www.jpl.nasa…#####
Description
This map shows a global three-day average of wind speeds over the world's oceans, as measured by the NASA Scatterometer onboard Japan's Advanced Earth Observing Satellite. The uncalibrated data were taken from September 20 to 22, 1996. The color indicates wind speed, with purple and blue being low winds, green to yellow as moderate winds, and orange to red as high winds. Typhoons Violet and Tom are shown as yellow-orange spirals near Japan. The usual high level of winter storm activity is also shown in yellow in the southern hemisphere near Antarctica in an area sailors refer to as "the roaring forties." NSCAT wind measurements cover 90 percent of the ocean surface each day, achieving nearly 100 percent coverage within three days. NSCAT provides continuous measurements of ocean surface wind speeds from space, which will help meteorologists better predict the behavior of storms. Data like these are being used by the National Weather Service, an agency of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in their global forecast models. NSCAT was launched August 16, 1996. The mission represents the first major collaboration in Earth remote sensing between the two nations. JPL developed, built and manages the NSCAT instrument for NASA's Mission to Planet Earth program. This "first look" image is still uncalibrated, but images like this will be routinely available after completion of the calibration validation phase on the project's World Wide Web site at http://www.jpl.nasa…#####
