Weather and Climate – Page 10

Louisiana Flooding: NASA Animation of Accumulated Rainfall

Published on 15 August 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

NASA Earth Observatory: “Days of intense rainfall in August 2016 led to widespread flooding in southern Louisiana, as rivers swelled high above their banks and many crested at record-high levels. […] The animation above shows satellite-based measurements of the rainfall as it accumulated over the southern United States. Specifically, it shows rainfall totals every three hours over the span of 72 hours from August 12-14, 2016. These rainfall totals are regional, remotely sensed estimates, and local amounts can be significantly higher when measured from the ground.”

Map of Thawed Areas Under Greenland’s Ice Sheet

Published on 8 August 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

greenland-melt — NASA Earth Observatory/Jesse Allen

NASA: “NASA researchers have helped produce the first map showing what parts of the bottom of the massive Greenland Ice Sheet are thawed— key information in better predicting how the ice sheet will react to a warming climate.”

Five Years of Drought

Published on 3 July 20163 July 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

Cartographer John Nelson, whose relatively new but infrequently updated map blog is Adventures in Mapping, recently posted the above map to Twitter: it shows the intensity and variability of drought in the United States over the past five years. It’s not necessarily an easy map to read at first glance, but it’s striking to look at nonetheless.

More Fort McMurray Satellite Images

Published on 16 May 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

Google Earth Blog has a roundup of the available satellite imagery of the Fort McMurray wildfire.

Previously: Satellite Imagery of Fort McMurray Wildfire Damage; DigitalGlobe Satellite Imagery of Fort McMurray; Fort McMurray Fire Roundup.

Satellite Imagery of Fort McMurray Wildfire Damage

Published on 15 May 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

Satellite imagery from the Pléiades-1A satellite showing the extent of wildfire damage caused to Fort McMurray, Alberta can be viewed through a web-based mapping application released by the government of Alberta. (Doesn’t work in Safari for Mac; works fine in Chrome.) [CBC News]

Previously: DigitalGlobe Satellite Imagery of Fort McMurray; Fort McMurray Fire Roundup.

DigitalGlobe Satellite Imagery of Fort McMurray

Published on 11 May 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

DigitalGlobe’s satellite imagery of the Fort McMurray wildfire, which uses “short wave infrared imagery (SWIR) to ‘cut’ through the smoke and identify the active footprint and burning hotspots” and reveals where buildings have been damaged or destroyed by the fire, can be viewed at Gizmodo and on DigitalGlobe’s own blog.

Previously: Fort McMurray Fire Roundup.

Fort McMurray Fire Roundup

Published on 7 May 20167 May 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

Here are some links to maps and satellite imagery of the wildfire that forced the evacuation of Fort McMurray, Alberta this week.

1. The fire is fuelled in part by abnormally high temperatures: 32°C (90°F) was reported earlier this week. The above temperature anomaly map, based on MODIS data from NASA’s Terra satellite, demonstrates how unusual these temperatures are: “The map above shows land surface temperature from April 26 to May 3, 2016, compared to the 2000–2010 average for the same one-week period. Red areas were hotter than the long-term average; blue areas were below average.”

2. NASA’s Earth Observatory is also assembling a collection of Landsat satellite images of the fire:

3 May

4 May

5 May

(Sources: 3 May, 4 May, 5 May)

3. Smoke from the fire is making it into the United States, and turning up on NOAA imagery:

Enahnced weatherView image shows winds carrying smoke from the Ft. McMurray Fire into the US https://t.co/HXtf1VFIgM pic.twitter.com/xDyTVFZJhp

— NOAA Satellites (@NOAASatellites) May 6, 2016

Look at the smoke from the Fort McMurray fire, it's traveled all the way to the gulf coast! pic.twitter.com/uEQigSCjqN

— Jim Cantore (@JimCantore) May 6, 2016

4. Maclean’s and CBC News have tried to depict the size of the fire by superimposing it on other cities in Canada and elsewhere in the world; so has Kyrstyn Morochuk, whose maps have been reposted by the Huffington Post. I’m not sure who came up with it first.

Previously: Canadian Wildfire Maps.

Canadian Wildfire Maps

Published on 4 May 20164 May 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

Yesterday wildfires swept through Fort McMurray, Alberta, the population centre of the oil sands industry, forcing the evacuation of nearly all of its more than 60,000 residents. It therefore seems timely to point to the maps produced by the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System. There are static maps of current conditions, fire danger maps providing an index of fire risk and potential damage (see above for today’s), and various forecasts, as well as an interactive version.

Using Clouds to Map Life

Published on 27 April 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

NASA Earth Observatory: “Clouds may seem like distant, ephemeral features that have little to do with life on Earth. In fact, they affect everything from the viability of ecosystems, to how much carbon plants absorb, to the reproductive success of reptiles. So by mapping clouds, new research shows, scientists can indirectly map life.”

1916 Frost Maps

Published on 9 April 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

In 1916 frost maps that show the average dates of the last spring and first fall killing frost, Slate’s Rebecca Onion sees the history of climate change, given the growth in the length of the growing season since then. (Trying to find a modern-day example for comparison; frost maps don’t appear to be updated as rigorously as, say, hardiness zone maps.) [Slate Vault]

Mapping Global Sea Surface Height

Published on 17 March 201621 March 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

jason3-20160315 — Credit: NASA/JPL Ocean Surface Topography Team.

Jason-3 is the latest earth observation satellite tasked with measuring global sea surface height; its data will be used in weather and climate research (e.g., El Niño, climate change). Launched on January 17, it’s now in its six-month checkout phase and has produced its first complete map, which corresponds well with the map produced by the still-operational Jason-2 satellite, so that’s a good sign. [via]

A Snowstorm Revealed Through Traffic Delays

Published on 30 January 201630 January 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

NPR graphics editor Alyson Hurt discovered that this month’s blizzard was showing up in Google Maps as traffic delays, and whipped up a little script that took regular screencaps of Google Maps’s traffic layer. She then created an animated GIF from the screencaps. The end result (above) dramatically shows the storm sweeping across the mid-Atlantic states.

Andy Woodruff then took Hurt’s script and created an animation of an ordinary day of Boston traffic. For a “quick, crude” script it certainly seems to have potential. [via]

NWS National Mosaic

Published on 25 January 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

The National Weather Service’s National Mosaic provides an uninterrupted look at the Doppler weather radar for the 48 contiguous U.S. states. Full-size version. [via]

Lake Poopó Dries Up

Published on 23 January 201623 January 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

[sciba leftsrc=”https://www.maproomblog.com/xq/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/lake-poopo-2013.jpg” leftlabel=”12 April 2013″ rightsrc=”https://www.maproomblog.com/xq/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/lake-poopo-2016.jpg” rightlabel=”15 January 2016″ mode=”horizontal” width=””]

Lake Poopó has become the Aral Sea of the Andes. Thanks to drought, water diversion and mining activity, the lake—long, wide, shallow, saline and the second-largest in Bolivia—has basically dried up, as this comparison of 2013 and 2016 Landsat 8 images demonstrates. CBC News, The Independent.

Surface Temperatures Warmest Since 1880

Published on 20 January 2016 by Jonathan Crowe

According to analyses by NASA and NOAA scientists, 2015 was the warmest year on record, with average surface temperatures the highest they’ve been since 1880. The above video shows the long-term warming trend since 1880 as a five-year rolling average. The baseline average is from 1951 to 1980; orange colours are warmer than that average, blue colours cooler. (Credit: GSFC Scientific Visualization Studio.)