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2006 Sea Surface Temperature
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| Title |
2006 Sea Surface Temperatures Rising in the Gulf of Mexico |
| Abstract |
Sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico rise due to natural summer warming. These warm surface temperatures are a contributing factor to favorable conditions that can lead to the formation of tropical storms and hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico and off the Eastern Shore of the United States. In general, hurricanes tend to form over warm ocean water whose temperature is 82 degrees Fahreheit (approximately 27.7 degrees Celsius) or higher. These areas are depicted in yellow, orange, and red. This data was taken by the AMSR-E instrument aboard the Aqua satellite. This animation depicts the 2006 seasonal changes. |
| Completed |
2006-05-24 |
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Fires in Mozambique and Tanz
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| Title |
Fires in Mozambique and Tanzania |
| Description |
East of where Lake Malawi fills one of the many cracks in the earth that mark Africa's Great Rift Valley, scores of fires were burning on October 1, 2006. The winds at the time of this image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov ] on NASA's Aqua [ http://aqua.nasa.gov ] satellite were pushing smoke southwest, creating a grayish haze over the western part of the image. The fires are scattered across southern Tanzania and northern Mozambique, places where the peak seasonal burning typically occurs in September or October. African savanna fires are mostly caused by humans for agricultural activities such as clearing pasture or cropland or driving game. Although the fires are not necessarily immediately hazardous, the frequency and wide extent of the burning can have strong influence on weather, climate, human health, and natural resources. NASA imagery created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of the MODIS Rapid Response [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] team. |
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Fires on Borneo and Sumatra
| Title |
Fires on Borneo and Sumatra |
| Description |
Smoke from agricultural and forest fires burning on Sumatra (left) and Borneo (right) in late September and early October 2006 blanketed a wide region with smoke that interrupted air and highway travel and pushed air quality to unhealthy levels. This image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov ] on NASA's Aqua [ http://aqua.nasa.gov ] satellite on October 1, 2006, shows places where MODIS detected actively burning fires marked in red. Smoke spreads in a gray-white pall to the north. Despite a governmental ban on open burning, seasonal fires continue to occur on the Indonesian islands each year, peaking in the dry season of late summer and early fall. Slash-and-burn deforestation to clear land for farming or other agriculture still takes place, and fires escape from already cleared land into adjacent forest. The swampy forests of the low-lying parts of these islands sit on thick layers of peat (un-decayed vegetation), which is extremely flammable when it dries out. The peat is exceptionally smoky when it burns. NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of the MODIS Rapid Response [ http://rapidresponse.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] team. |
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Tropical Storm Bebinca
| Title |
Tropical Storm Bebinca |
| Description |
Tropical Storm Bebinca formed as a tropical depression (area of low air pressure) early in the morning on October 1, 2006, east of the Philippines. Over the course of the next day, the depression gradually moved north and east away from the island chain and gained enough power to become a storm and earn a name. Despite moving farther offshore into the Pacific, Bebinca was largely staying over waters recently cooled by the powerful Typhoon Xangsane, [ /NaturalHazards/natural_hazards_v2.php3?img_id=13913 ] which formed in the same general area approximately a week before Bebinca. The storm system was not expected to develop into a typhoon as of October 5, according to the University of Hawaii's Tropical Storm Information Center. [ http://www.solar.ifa.hawaii.edu/Tropical/tropical.html ] This data visualization shows Bebinca just as the depression was becoming strong enough to be classified as a tropical storm. The image depicts wind speed in color and wind direction with small barbs. White barbs point to areas of heavy rain. The data were obtained by NASA's QuikSCAT [ http://winds.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/quikscat/index.cfm ] satellite on October 2, 2006, at 09:16 UTC (5:16 p.m. local time). Bebinca appears to be quite asymmetrically shaped at this time, with wind-direction barbs showing that the center of the storm has an area of relatively calm winds, while more intense winds are located in the southwestern portion of the storm. The center, or eye, of the storm is well-defined by wind direction, but the wind speeds are not symmetrical. Weak winds around the storm's center show that the storm system does not have the classic eye and eyewall of a typhoon, which a more intense storm would have. QuikSCAT employs a scatterometer, which sends pulses of microwave energy through the atmosphere to the ocean surface, and measures the energy that bounces back from the wind-roughened surface. The energy of the microwave pulses changes depending on wind speed and direction, giving scientists a way to monitor wind around the world. This technique does not work over land, and hence the lack of measurements over the Philippine Islands shown here. NASA image courtesy of David Long, Brigham Young University, on the QuikSCAT Science Team [ http://winds.jpl.nasa.gov/ ], and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. |
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Typhoon Xangsane
| Title |
Typhoon Xangsane |
| Description |
Typhoon Xangsane formed on September 25, 2006, in the western Pacific near the coast of the Philippine Islands. Over the next 36 hours, it grew from a tropical depression (area of low air pressure) to a typhoon. The typhoon crossed the Philippines and was credited for causing 76 deaths there before crossing the South China Sea and coming ashore in central Vietnam on October 1, according to the Agence France-Presse news service. As the storm came ashore in central Vietnam, it packed winds of 148 kilometers per hour (92 miles per hour), causing another six deaths and many injuries. Vietnamese authorities called Typhoon Xangsane the biggest storm to hit the country in several decades. This photo-like image was acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] on the Terra [ http://terra.nasa.gov/ ] satellite on October 1, 2006, at 10:10 a.m. local time (03:10 UTC). Xangsane at the time of this image was a well-defined spiral of clouds, but other typhoon characteristics were not obvious. It lacked a well-defined eye, and the spiral arms of the storm did not have sharp edges or evidence of strong thunderstorms. Much of the initial power of the storm had apparently been sapped as the typhoon came over land. NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of the MODIS Rapid Response [ http://rapidresponse.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] team. |
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Typhoon Xangsane Floods Viet
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| Title |
Typhoon Xangsane Floods Vietnam |
| Description |
Typhoon Xangsane slammed into the coast of Vietnam on October 1, 2006, pounding the coastal city of Da Nang with sustained winds of 150 kilometers per hour (90 miles per hour) and heavy rain. The storm moved west over Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand, and by October 3, the clouds had cleared enough to give the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov ]) on NASA's Aqua [ http://aqua.nasa.gov/ ] satellite a view of the hard-hit Vietnam coast. The image, top, reveals that Xangsane left extensive flooding in its wake. The land between the Vu Gia River and the Thu Bon River is covered with water. Mud gives the water on land its pale blue color in contrast to the dark blue and black seen in the ocean. As the sediment-laden water empties into the ocean, it pours a cloud of sediment into the ocean. The sediment creates the bright blue fan along the shore and in the bay near Da Nang. Though flooding isn't visible in Da Nang itself, the sediment in the bay suggests that the region may be flooded. Most obviously flooded is Hoi An, a historic port city that is a World Heritage Site. [ http://whc.unesco.org/pg.cfm?cid=31&id_site=948 ] The image shows that the Thu Bon River had burst its banks and was flowing through the city. According to the Associated Press, [ http://www.usatoday.com/weather/storms/2006-10-03-asia-typhoon_x.htm ] Typhoon Xangsane caused extensive damage in Da Nang, Hoi An, and the surrounding communities. The storm had killed 119 people as of October 2. Of these deaths, 41 were in Vietnam, and the remaining 78 were in the Philippines. In the city of Da Nang, which has 770,000 residents, 12,000 homes were destroyed and 113,000 were damaged, said the Associated Press. The lower image shows the region on September 9, 2006, and provides a perspective on normal conditions. Both images were created with a combination of visible and infrared light, which increases the contrast between water and land. In these images, water ranges from black to light blue, the color being lighter when the water is filled with sediment. Clouds are turquoise blue and white, plant-covered land is bright green, and bare earth, such as the cities or the beach, is tan. Red boxes outline regions where MODIS detected fires. Photo-like, true-color versions [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?FAS_Indochina/2006276 ] of the images are available from the MODIS Rapid Response Team. NASA images courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov ] at NASA GSFC. |
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Volcanic Activity on Soufrie
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| Title |
Volcanic Activity on Soufriere Hills |
| Description |
The Soufriere Hills Volcano on the island of Montserrat produced a plume of volcanic ash and/or steam on October 1, 2006. This event was part of a continuing pattern of intermittent eruptions from the volcano. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] flying onboard the Aqua [ http://aqua.nasa.gov/ ] satellite took this picture the same day. In this image, the island of Montserrat shows an area outlined in red, where the MODIS sensor detected a thermal hotspot—an area with a significantly warmer surface temperature than its surroundings. The plume of volcanic ash blows westward over the Caribbean Sea, gradually dissipating as it moves away. The Soufriere Hills Volcano [ http://www.volcano.si.edu/world/volcano.cfm?vnum=1600-05= ] is a stratovolcano composed of alternating layers of hardened lava, volcanic ash, and rocks. No recorded eruptions of the volcano occurred before 1995, but since then, volcanic ash emissions have posed recurring health hazards for Montserrat's residents, including eye and respiratory tract irritation. NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of the Goddard Earth Sciences DAAC. [ http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/ ] |
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