During the last four years of the CyMISS (Tropical Cyclone Intensity Measurements from the ISS) program, our team has acquired image sequences of several dozen powerful hurricanes, typhoons and tropical cyclones scattered across the globe. One of the best observed of these powerful storms was Hurricane Matthew during the first half of October 2016. Between October 1 and October 13, the crew of the ISS secured a total of eight images sequences in support of CyMISS from as many overpasses on seven different days as this powerful hurricane worked its way across the Caribbean Sea and up the US Atlantic coast. The individual photographs from the original 240-image sequences were remapped to approximate an overhead view before they were stitched together into a series of synoptic color mosaics shown below for each overpass. Each mosaic covers an area of 1,500 by 1,000 kilometers.
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 20:28 GMT on October 1, 2016. The eye of the storm was located at about 13.5° N, 73.4° W in the Caribbean Sea off the coast of South America and was rated a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 150 mph. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 20:20 GMT on October 3, 2016. The eye of the storm was located at about 16.2° N, 74.7° W and was rated a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 140 mph. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 21:05 GMT on October 4, 2016. The eye of the storm was located at about 19.8° N, 74.3° W between Cuba and Haiti and was rated a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 140 mph. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 19:22 GMT on October 6, 2016 – the first ISS overpass of the day. The eye of the storm was located at about 26.1° N, 78.5° W over the Bahamas and was rated a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 140 mph. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 20:58 GMT on October 6, 2016 – the second ISS overpass of the day. The eye of the storm was located at about 26.2° N, 78.6° W as it was making its way towards Florida and was rated a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 140 mph. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 20:06 GMT on October 7, 2016. The eye of the storm was located at about 30.1° N, 80.7° W and was being downgraded to a Category 2 storm with sustained winds of 110 mph as it skirted along Florida’s Atlantic coast. Note that the Gulf coast as far as the Mississippi delta is visible beyond Matthew. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of Hurricane Matthew was created from images acquired at about 20:52 GMT on October 8, 2016. The eye of the storm was located at about 33.8° N, 78.2° W near Cape Fear, North Carolina and was a quickly weakening a Category 1 storm with sustained winds of 75 mph. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
This synoptic view of the remains of Hurricane (now Post-Tropical Cyclone) Matthew was created from images acquired at about 18:09 GMT on October 13, 2016 as the storm moved out into the Atlantic Ocean and had a chance to reorganize. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 1 km/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
November’s Image of the Month is a 3D view of Hurricane Matthew created using images acquired around 20:06 GMT (4:06 PM EDT) on October 7, 2016. The eye of the storm was located at about 30.1° N, 80.7° W and was being downgraded to a Category 2 storm with sustained winds of 110 mph as it moved along Florida’s Atlantic coast. In order to create this anaglyphic 3D image (left eye red, right eye blue), the red channels of the individual photographs from the original 240-image sequence were remapped to approximate an overhead view before various parts of the frames were stitched together into a synoptic 3D mosaic covering an area of 1,600 by 1,200 kilometers. Processed versions of the images’ red channels were used to cut through the atmospheric haze to provide a clearer 3D view of the storm with a stereo angle of about 15° as well as the southeastern US visible beyond the storm including the Gulf coast out to the Mississippi delta. Clouds associated with Hurricane Matthew clearly stand out above the ground and lower altitude cumulus clouds over the Gulf of Mexico and the southeastern US. Because of the disruption of the storm as it interacted with the mainland, a clearly defined eye was not visible at this time. A high resolution version of this synoptic 3D mosaic with an image scale of 500 meters/pixel can be viewed by clicking on the image below.
This is an anaglyphic 3D mosaic (left eye red, right eye blue) of Hurricane Matthew as seen from the ISS at about 20:06 GMT on October 7, 2016. It was created by combining various parts of the 240 red-channel images which have been processed to approximate a common overhead view covering an area of 1,600 by 1,200 kilometers. Click on the image to view the full-size version at a scale of 500 meters/pixel. (A.J. LePage/Visidyne/JSC-NASA)
The goal of the ongoing CyMISS (Tropical Cyclone Intensity Measurements from the ISS) project is to acquire image sequences of intense tropical cyclones (TCs), such as hurricanes, to support the development of an improved remote sensing method to determine more accurately the strength of these destructive storms using stereoscopy. The CyMISS team at Visidyne would like to thank the crew of the ISS as well as the staff at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and Johnson Space Center for their ongoing efforts. The original images are courtesy of the Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit at NASA Johnson Space Center. The work presented here is supported in part under CASIS Grant UA-2019-013.
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See earlier articles on the CyMISS program here.