|
|
Cyclone Jacob
| Title |
Cyclone Jacob |
| Description |
Tropical Cyclone Jacob was in the eastern Indian Ocean off the shore of Western Australia on March 10, 2007. This storm had been moving towards the Pilbara coast of northwestern Australia for several days, coming in from the northeast after forming south of Java several days earlier. This photo-like image of Jacob was acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] on the Aqua [ http://aqua.nasa.gov/ ] satellite on March 10, 2007, at 2:10 p.m. local time (06:10 UTC). The storm was a moderate-strength tropical cyclone with an irregular shape and no obvious eyewall (ring of towering clouds) at its center. According to the University of Hawaii's Tropical Storm Information Center, [ http://www.solar.ifa.hawaii.edu/Tropical/ ] Cyclone Jacob has sustained winds of 140 kilometers per hour (90 miles per hour) around the time this image was acquired. Jacob was forecast to come ashore near Port Hedland, not far from where Cyclone George [ http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/natural_hazards_v2.php3?img_id=14163 ] made landfall days earlier. Jacob was not expected to be nearly as powerful, but it will hinder efforts to recover from George. The high-resolution image provided above is at MODIS' full spatial resolution (level of detail) of 250 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at additional resolutions. [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/?2007069-0310/Jacob.A2007069.0610 ] You can also download a 250-meter-resolution Cyclone Jacob KMZ file [ http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/Archive/Mar2007/Jacob.A2007069.0610.250m.kmz ] for use with Google Earth. [ http://earth.google.com/download-earth.html ] NASA image by Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov ] Goddard Space Flight Center. |
|
Fires in Central and Souther
…
| Title |
Fires in Central and Southern Africa |
| Description |
This Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer image from August 27, 2002, shows just how strongly the southern African burning season can impact regional air quality. In this image, numerous fires (red dots) were detected by MODIS beneath a shroud of smoke that all but obscures Democratic Republic of Congo (top) and Angola (bottom). Image by Jesse Allen, based on data from the MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA-GSFC |
|
Hurricane Isabel, AIRS Infra
…
PIA00429
Sol (our sun)
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder
…
| Title |
Hurricane Isabel, AIRS Infrared and SeaWinds Scatterometer Data Combined |
| Original Caption Released with Image |
These two images show Hurricane Isabel as viewed by AIRS and each of the two SeaWinds scatterometers on the ADEOS-2 and QuikScat satellites, all JPL-managed experiments. AIRS data are used to create global three-dimensional maps of temperature, humidity and clouds, while scatterometers measure surface wind speed and direction. Figure 1 shows Isabel on September 13, 2003, when it was a Category 5 storm threatening the Caribbean and southern United States. At the time Isabel was the strongest Atlantic storm since hurricane Mitch killed thousands in central America in 1997. The red vectors in the image show Isabel's surface winds as measured by SeaWinds on ADEOS-2, and the background colors show the temperature of clouds and surface, as viewed in the infrared by AIRS. The hurricane's powerful swirling winds are apparent. These winds circle the hurricane's eye, seen as the red dot near the middle top of the image. Light blue areas shows adjacent cold clouds tops associated with strong thunderstorms embedded within the storm. Figure 2 shows Isabel as it approached landfall on the outer banks of North Carolina on September 18. The hurricane weakened in the five days since the earlier image was observed, as indicated by a less clearly defined eye. Nevertheless, it was still a powerful storm. The winds blowing onshore north of the eye knocked over trees, blew roofs off buildings, and drove large waves that breached the coastal barrier islands in many places. Water, transportation and power are still not fully restored to many of the areas in the image. The winds apparently blowing away from the eye of the storm are an artifact of one of the hurricane's other destructive phenomena: rain. The darkest blue clouds observed by AIRS show the most intense thunderstorms, and hence the heaviest rains. Hard rain fools the the SeaWinds on QuikSCAT system into thinking the winds are blowing directly across the viewing 'swath.' Nevertheless, the two systems give a consistent picture of this storm. |
|
Hurricane Isabel, AIRS Infra
…
PIA00429
Sol (our sun)
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder
…
| Title |
Hurricane Isabel, AIRS Infrared and SeaWinds Scatterometer Data Combined |
| Original Caption Released with Image |
These two images show Hurricane Isabel as viewed by AIRS and each of the two SeaWinds scatterometers on the ADEOS-2 and QuikScat satellites, all JPL-managed experiments. AIRS data are used to create global three-dimensional maps of temperature, humidity and clouds, while scatterometers measure surface wind speed and direction. Figure 1 shows Isabel on September 13, 2003, when it was a Category 5 storm threatening the Caribbean and southern United States. At the time Isabel was the strongest Atlantic storm since hurricane Mitch killed thousands in central America in 1997. The red vectors in the image show Isabel's surface winds as measured by SeaWinds on ADEOS-2, and the background colors show the temperature of clouds and surface, as viewed in the infrared by AIRS. The hurricane's powerful swirling winds are apparent. These winds circle the hurricane's eye, seen as the red dot near the middle top of the image. Light blue areas shows adjacent cold clouds tops associated with strong thunderstorms embedded within the storm. Figure 2 shows Isabel as it approached landfall on the outer banks of North Carolina on September 18. The hurricane weakened in the five days since the earlier image was observed, as indicated by a less clearly defined eye. Nevertheless, it was still a powerful storm. The winds blowing onshore north of the eye knocked over trees, blew roofs off buildings, and drove large waves that breached the coastal barrier islands in many places. Water, transportation and power are still not fully restored to many of the areas in the image. The winds apparently blowing away from the eye of the storm are an artifact of one of the hurricane's other destructive phenomena: rain. The darkest blue clouds observed by AIRS show the most intense thunderstorms, and hence the heaviest rains. Hard rain fools the the SeaWinds on QuikSCAT system into thinking the winds are blowing directly across the viewing 'swath.' Nevertheless, the two systems give a consistent picture of this storm. |
|
Hurricane Isabel, AIRS Infra
…
PIA00429
Sol (our sun)
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder
…
| Title |
Hurricane Isabel, AIRS Infrared and SeaWinds Scatterometer Data Combined |
| Original Caption Released with Image |
These two images show Hurricane Isabel as viewed by AIRS and each of the two SeaWinds scatterometers on the ADEOS-2 and QuikScat satellites, all JPL-managed experiments. AIRS data are used to create global three-dimensional maps of temperature, humidity and clouds, while scatterometers measure surface wind speed and direction. Figure 1 shows Isabel on September 13, 2003, when it was a Category 5 storm threatening the Caribbean and southern United States. At the time Isabel was the strongest Atlantic storm since hurricane Mitch killed thousands in central America in 1997. The red vectors in the image show Isabel's surface winds as measured by SeaWinds on ADEOS-2, and the background colors show the temperature of clouds and surface, as viewed in the infrared by AIRS. The hurricane's powerful swirling winds are apparent. These winds circle the hurricane's eye, seen as the red dot near the middle top of the image. Light blue areas shows adjacent cold clouds tops associated with strong thunderstorms embedded within the storm. Figure 2 shows Isabel as it approached landfall on the outer banks of North Carolina on September 18. The hurricane weakened in the five days since the earlier image was observed, as indicated by a less clearly defined eye. Nevertheless, it was still a powerful storm. The winds blowing onshore north of the eye knocked over trees, blew roofs off buildings, and drove large waves that breached the coastal barrier islands in many places. Water, transportation and power are still not fully restored to many of the areas in the image. The winds apparently blowing away from the eye of the storm are an artifact of one of the hurricane's other destructive phenomena: rain. The darkest blue clouds observed by AIRS show the most intense thunderstorms, and hence the heaviest rains. Hard rain fools the the SeaWinds on QuikSCAT system into thinking the winds are blowing directly across the viewing 'swath.' Nevertheless, the two systems give a consistent picture of this storm. |
|
NASA's Newest SeaWinds Instr
…
PIA03896
Sol (our sun)
SeaWinds Scatterometer
| Title |
NASA's Newest SeaWinds Instrument Breezes Into Operation |
| Original Caption Released with Image |
One of NASA's newest Earth-observing instruments, the SeaWinds scatterometer aboard Japan's Advanced Earth Observing Satellite (Adeos) 2--now renamed Midori 2--has successfully transmitted its first radar data to our home planet, generating its first high-quality images. From its orbiting perch high above Earth, SeaWinds on Midori 2 ('midori' is Japanese for the color green, symbolizing the environment) will provide the world's most accurate, highest resolution and broadest geographic coverage of ocean wind speed and direction, sea ice extent and properties of Earth's land surfaces. It will complement and eventually replace an identical instrument orbiting since June 1999 on NASA's Quick Scatterometer (QuikScat) satellite. Its three- to five-year mission will augment a long-term ocean surface wind data series that began in 1996 with launch of the NASA Scatterometer on Japan's first Adeos spacecraft. Climatologists, meteorologists and oceanographers will soon routinely use data from SeaWinds on Midori 2 to understand and predict severe weather patterns, climate change and global weather abnormalities like El Niño. The data are expected to improve global and regional weather forecasts, ship routing and marine hazard avoidance, measurements of sea ice extent and the tracking of icebergs, among other uses.'Midori 2, its SeaWinds instrument and associated ground processing systems are functioning very smoothly,' said Moshe Pniel, scatterometer projects manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "Following initial checkout and calibration, we look forward to continuous operations, providing vital data to scientists and weather forecasters around the world.""These first images show remarkable detail over land, ice and oceans," said Dr. Michael Freilich, Ocean Vector Winds Science Team Leader, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Ore. "The combination of SeaWinds data and measurements from other instruments on Midori 2 with data from other international satellites will enable detailed studies of ocean circulation, air-sea interaction and climate variation simply not possible until now." The released image, obtained from data collected January 28-29, depicts Earth's continents in green, polar glacial ice-covered regions in blue-red and sea ice in gray. Color and intensity changes over ice and land are related to ice melting, variations in land surface roughness and vegetation cover. Ocean surface wind speeds, measured during a 12-hour period on January 28, are shown by colors, with blues corresponding to low wind speeds and reds to wind speeds up to 15 meters per second (30 knots). Black arrows denote wind direction. White gaps over the oceans represent unmeasured areas between SeaWinds swaths (the instrument measures winds over about 90 percent of the oceans each day). SeaWinds transmits high-frequency microwave pulses to Earth's land masses, ice cover and ocean surface and measures the strength of the radar pulses that bounce, back to the instrument. It takes millions of radar measurements covering about 93 percent of Earth's surface every day, operating under all weather conditions, day and night. Over the oceans, SeaWinds senses ripples caused by the winds, from which scientists can compute wind speed and direction. These ocean surface winds drive Earth's oceans and control the exchange of heat, moisture and gases between the atmosphere and the sea. Launched December 14, 2002, from Japan, the instrument was first activated on January 10 and transitioned to its normal science mode on January 28. A four-day dedicated checkout period was completed on January 31. A six-month calibration/validation phase will begin in April, with regular science operations scheduled to begin this October. SeaWinds on Midori 2 is managed for NASA's Office of Earth Science, Washington, D.C., by JPL, which developed the instrument and performs instrument operations and science data processing, archiving and distribution. NASA also provides U.S. ground system support. The National Space Development Agency of Japan, or NASDA, provided the Midori 2 spacecraft, H-IIA launch vehicle, mission operations and the Japanese ground network. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration provides near-real-time data processing and distribution for SeaWinds operational data users. The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA. |
|
|
