Satellite Image of the Day
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Satellite: NOAA-15
August 2, 2004; flyover beginning 7:33am EDT
The two images below show Tropical Storm Alex early this morning.
The image on the left is a false color image from the vantage point of NOAA's 850km-high (530 mile-high) Polar Orbiting satellites (NOAA-15here)
The image on the right is a thermal image of the same area taken at the same time.

This picture shows now-tropical-storm Alex as it aims for landfall at Charleston, SC.
For those of us in southwest Virginia, note how the counterclockwise rotation of Alex is pulling moisture from the Atlantic over the entire mid-Atlantic region, making for very rainy conditions.
Click on the image below for a higher-resolution (>100k) image.

The thermal image below shows the temperature distribution of Alex.
Note how cold the upper-level clouds are: -500C.
However, also note that Alex did not pull enough heat energy from the open ocean to cause the characteristic "eye" of a a hurricane, a region of calm surrounded by a sudden, powerful, swirling wall of high clouds, dangerous winds, and great destruction.
Any hurricane "eye" would show up on this image as a circular region whose temperature is that of the (exposed) open ocean below, around 15-200C or higher.
Click on the image below for a higher-resolution (>100k) image.