GOES-15 1st Full Disk Images of Earth

From NOAA:

" GOES-15 took its first operational full disk images at 1800z on December 6, 2011. These three images show some of the imagery acquired, including the native gray-scale infrared, colorized infrared, colorized infrared water vapor, and visible imagery. The orange areas of the colorized water vapor image show areas with low moisture. The dry air associated with the Santa Ana winds in California are clearly visible. GOES-15's water vapor channel has major improvements over its predecessor on GOES-11 (the previous GOES-West)."


The images:

Absolutely stunning!

GOES (Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites) -15 took the place of GOES-11 which was launched in  May 2000. GOES-11 was only planned for 5 years but tracked weather and severe storms along the the Pacific region and the U.S. West Coast, for 12 years. GOES-11 is in the process of being deactivated and now GOES-15, a more advanced satellite, is fixed in this region. GOES-13 tracks the East Coast. GOES-12 tracks South America and GOES-14 is a ready backup or replacement. GOES satellites can also track oceanographic changes, space weather, forest fires and other hazards.

GOES-R is the next generation of satellites to be launched starting in 2015, by NOAA. More frequent images and clearer atmospheric observations is expected by this next generation of satellites.

For more information on GOES, check out this link.

October Wonderland

Parts of the Northeast are waking up to a winter wonderland more than a brisk, fall day. Yesterday a rare October Nor'easter struck, causing power outages to over 2 million people. Much snow fell in the Northern states, breaking records in New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts and others.  Many Mid-Atlantic states don't see their first snowfall until about next month or so! A state of emergency has been called in New Jersey and New York. The event has been rendered historic and by Twitter #snoctober and #snowtober.

Here is a map from NOAA, showing the total snowfall amounts:

Here is a statement summarizing the snowfall totals and the event.

The event was caused by an offshore low pressure system and cold air. The low pumped moisture from the ocean, in which the ocean temperature is considerably warmer than air temperature over land.  There were periods of rain, sleet and snow with this storm. Moisture was also pumped from a low pressure to the South.

Here in Adelphi, MD the start of the day was mostly rain.  I saw on a few social network sites my friends in Northern New Jersey and New York were posting pictures of the snow that had already fallen in their area. It changed over to sleet around 1:30 PM. I took this video of the sleet with my cell phone (you might have to rotate the video).



I thought I saw a few snow flurries after the sleet. Then there was nothing but wind. The sun started to break through a bit. Then around 2:20 PM, it really started to snow, and it snowed hard. Here is a video I took of the snow. That car to the right is my car by the way :-)



In total, by me the snow accumulation was nonexistent. The snow looked pretty coming down though.

Here is a picture of the snow from my friend and former classmate Darren Milliron. He lives in Netcong, NJ. Check out his blog here.

Happy Halloween?

Northern Lights Illuminate Southern Skies

Last night for some lucky people in the South, the Northern Lights dazzled across the dark sky. (Sorry that's a bit of my poetry language coming out).  I unfortunately did not see this beautiful phenomenon :-( The Northern Lights are one of my favorite phenomena. Hopefully one day I'll get to see them in person, whether it's here in the DC metro area or...Maine :-)

Here is an article by Seth Borenstein from the Associated Press, explaining the event:

"Northern lights take unusual trip down south"

WASHINGTON—A baffling solar storm pulled colorful northern lights unusually far south, surprising space weather experts and treating skywatchers to a rare and spectacular treat.

A storm-chasing photographer captured the strange sky show in Arkansas Monday night. People in Kentucky and Georgia reported their sightings to local television stations. A special automated NASA camera that takes a picture of the sky every minute in Huntsville, Ala., captured 20 minutes of the vibrant red and green aurora borealis.

In Arkansas, Brian Emfinger called the view "extremely vivid, the most vivid I have ever seen. There was just 15 to 20 minutes where it really went crazy."

Emfinger, a storm chaser, captured the vibrant nighttime images on camera in Ozark, Ark.

He called it "a much bigger deal" than a tornado" because he sees dozens of those every year. This is only the second northern lights in a decade that he has seen this far south.

"They are very rare events," said NASA scientist Bill Cooke, who found the aurora photos in the Alabama camera's archive and posted them on the Marshall Space Flight Center's blog. "We don't see them this far south that often."

Officials at the federal Space Weather Prediction Center in Boulder, Colo., said they were surprised at the southern reach. The center monitors solar storms, which trigger auroras.

Space weather forecast chief Bob Rutledge said given the size of the solar storm, the lights probably shouldn't have been visible south of Iowa. The storm was only considered "moderate" sized, he said.

He called the storm unusual, its effects reaching Earth eight hours faster than forecast. But that timing made it just about perfect for U.S. viewing, he said.

"The peak of the intensity happened when it was dark or becoming dark over the U.S., coupled with the clear skies. We did have significant aurora sightings," Rutledge said. "The timing was good on this."

In Huntsville, the aurora lasted from 8:25 p.m. to 8:45 p.m. CDT, Cooke said. In Arkansas, Emfinger went out shortly after sunset after getting a space weather alert. He saw auroras that lasted until after 11 p.m.

An aurora begins with a storm shooting a magnetic solar wind from the sun. The wind slams into Earth's magnetic field, compressing it. That excites electrons of oxygen and nitrogen. When those excited electrons calm down, they emit red and green colors, Rutledge said.

Often solar storms can cause damage satellites and power grids. This one didn't, Rutledge said."

This picture by @WxJax shows the Northern Lights in Laurel, VA.

Here is a picture from Madison, WI from DakotaLapse.com:

  

This was the view in Alabama:

  

This time lapse video of the aurora in Michigan by Lakefxnet is amazing!!!:

Ok I'm done drooling, hehe.

Inside A Tornado On I-95 in VA

Last night storms spawned some possible tornadoes in parts of the Mid-Atlantic. Here is one video of a motorist on I-95 in Virginia, when a tornado struck. Note: There is heavy language in this video.




The video is from Youtube user TeamInsaneRCRacing.

NASA Tweetup STS-135 in Washington, DC

          Yesterday, I got the chance to see astronauts Christopher Ferguson @Astro_Ferg and Sandy Magnus @Astro_Sandy at the NASA Tweetup STS-135 event in Washington, DC.  If you are wondering what a Tweetup is, according to NASA a tweetup is "...An informal meeting of people who use the social messaging medium Twitter. NASA Tweetups provide @NASA followers with the opportunity to go behind-the-scenes at NASA facilities and events and speak with scientists, engineers, astronauts and managers. NASA Tweetups range from two hours to two days in length and include a "meet and greet" session to allow participants to mingle with fellow Tweeps and the people behind NASA's Twitter feeds." People that follow @NASATweetup also are provided the opportunity to attend and the account features the latest information about NASATweeup events.  The first NASATweetup was On January 21, 2009 at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
         I saw that NASA was having a tweetup at their headquarters in Washington, DC through my @weathersavvy1 account and I registered during the September 29th to September 30th period.  I saw that 150 participants would be selected at random and I crossed my fingers. On October 4th I received an email from Social Media Manager and Public Affairs Specialist at NASA, Stephanie Schierholz @schierholz, that I was not selected and I was on the waiting list. I crossed my fingers again and on October 6th, I received the confirmation that I had been selected!
       The event started at 4:00 pm EST, and was an hour long. At the event highlights of the STS-135 mission and the space program were discussed. STS-135 had actually started out as a rescue mission, delivering 9,400 pounds of spare parts and 2, 677 pounds of food. This is to help operations at the space station for the next year. The mission also brought back 5,7000 pounds of material from the station that was not needed. STS-135 was the final shuttle flight and also the 135th space shuttle to go into outer space.  25 states where represented at the event with the farthest United States attendees, coming from California. Attendees also came from Canada and Germany. The event was also broadcasted live on the NASA website.
      I wrote about STS-135 back in July when the space shuttle successfully landed on July 21, 2011. Here is that blog entry. I would have never thought, that some three months after writing that entry, I'd be seeing two of the astronauts aboard the space craft in person, and getting my picture with Sandy Magnus. Here is that picture:

I also got her signature :-)

      The event was amazing and I really want to thank everyone who made this event possible. It is a great way to connect with the NASA and people that share common interests. Our world is definitely changing and like Astronaut Sandy Magnus said, "It's about learning." It was my first NASA Tweetup and I will assure, it definitely won't be my last :-)

Here are more pictures from the event:

 Me in front of the NASA building

 Astronauts Christopher Ferguson and Sandy Magnus.

 The program.

 List of the participants.

 The NASA swag bag.

 The commemorative pin, it contains metal flown aboard a space shuttle!

 For more information about the STS-135 mission, check out this link.

Thanks again everyone involved, for this amazing opportunity and thank you to my boyfriend, Rex for taking some of the photos.

Mount Tambora Ready to Explode Again

 

source

 From Jesus Diaz, Gizomodo

 The Deadliest Volcano In the Planet Is Ready to Explode Again

The last time the deadliest volcano in the planet exploded it was 1815. It killed more than 71,000 people on the spot and it was responsible for a volcanic winter that caused the worst worldwide famine of the 19th century.Now it may explode again.

Its name is Mount Tambora and it's located in the island of Sumbawa, Indonesia. And while it wasn't the most powerful volcano explosion in history, it's the one that caused more direct and indirect deaths. When it happened in April 1815, Sumbawa was obliterated. The caldera collapsed then, following some months of heavy activity. Most of the island's population was killed and its vegetation was reduced to ashes. Some trees were uprooted and pushed into the sea along with ash, creating three-mile-long rafts. And tsunamis generated by the explosion affected islands nearby. But its destructive power wasn't just limited to that area. It affected the entire world. The volcano's ash rose into a column that reached 140,000 feet (43 kilometers) high, right into the stratosphere. The heaviest particles eventually went down, but a stratospheric sulfate aerosol veil remained for years, dimming the sunlight everywhere. This disrupted the entire global climate in a big way, which started a chain of events that killed millions through the Northern Hemisphere.

Deadly volcanic winter

The next year there was no summer and temperatures went down an average of 0.5 degrees Celsius. It doesn't seem like a lot but the suspended sulfur released by the volcano caused agricultural crops to fail and livestock to die everywhere. The United States experienced extreme frosts and heavy snow well into July, ruining everything in the fields. The same happened elsewhere, causing a worldwide famine. This famine helped to spread a new strain of cholera in Asia and a typhus epidemic in southeast Europe and the eastern Mediterranean. It wasn't fun at all.

Experts are now saying that Mount Tambora is ready to erupt again. A steady stream of earthquakes are shaking the island, from less than five a month in April to more than 200 now. Columns of ash are already venting as high as 4,600 feet. The authorities have already established a 2-mile danger perimeter and its inhabitants are fleeing under government orders. But most of the people know the story from 1815 and don't need any orders to start running. In fact, people outside of the danger zone are also fleeing out of pure fear. Nobody knows for sure if Mount Tambora would explode with the same intensity as it did in 1815 and nobody knows when it would explode. But we know it is awakening, and that's not good at all.

source

Did They Listen?

I posted a blog entry yesterday around this time, stating the frustration I had over television stations like CNN and The Weather Channel posting pictures and videos of people driving their vehicles through flooded waters. I tweeted my entry to the Weather Channel and not too long after I tweeted them the blog entry, I saw that they tweet message relating to people driving through flood waters.  The tweets are shown below:

 

Did they listen? The tweet could be purely coincidence but the tweet was a link to meteorologist Tim Ballisty's article The Power of Water. The article can be found here. In the article, Ballisty writes about facts associated with flowing water. The facts pertain to what flowing water can do to a person, a car and a house. I took a screenshot of one of the images featured in the article: 

Underneath the picture Ballisty writes,"We see it all the time: people misjudge the force of water and drive right into flowing floodwaters. Some are rescued by first-responders; others perish." Then why Weather Channel do you show images of people driving through the waters without any type of safety tip or statement such as this?  

I commented on the article stating the article is very educational, which it is.  With all this rain and flooding it is more of a time to educate, not just show the extent of what nature can do and the situations that can make matters worse.

I also noticed that the Capital Weather Gang, addressed the issue on their blog, of people basically ignoring "Turn Around, Don't Drown."Here is the link. If we are going to report what's going on, we need to get on the same page. Educate! Don't devastate the campaign of "Turn Around, Don't Drown."

Turn Around Don't Drown: The Lost Campaign

In wake of the Hurricane Irene and the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee dumping rain along the East coast, I have seen numerous pictures and videos of people driving through the flooded waters, on major television stations like CNN or The Weather Channel. Does anyone remember the "Turn Around, Don't Drown" campaign? By showing viewers vehicles driving through the waters, some may be under the impression that their vehicle can make it. In fact, more than half of flood related deaths occur from vehicles caught in the flood waters and floods are the number one cause of weather related deaths in the United States.

A road may look like it is passable but the actual depth of the water is not always certain from behind the wheel. It's frustrating to see channels such as CNN or the Weather Channel show these kinds of images from I-Reporters without stating the safety behind the images they choose to display.

I follow The Weather Channel on Twitter and recently saw this tweet:

The first picture that pops up when you click on the tweet is of a truck driving through flooded waters. Yes this image shows the extent of flooding from that viewer's perspective but so does a clear street with no cars driving through it. That would be the more safe approach and would not make it seem as though the "Turn Around, Don't Drown," campaign has been lost. Maybe a picture like would be better to get the point across:

One thing that is very certain is that flash floods can quickly occur and even though a driver may make it through one stretch of road, a flash flood could have occurred on another stretch and their vehicle might get stuck on that one.

So next when you post a picture or a video from a viewer showing the extent of what's going on in their area, follow it up with a safety tip or so. We report the weather to help save lives not just show the extent of what nature can do.

For more information on the "Turn Around, Don't Drown" campaign, lease visit this link.