2001 EARTH SCIENCE VIDEOTAPES |
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Tape Title | Record ID | Date Produced | TRT: |
Synopsis |
| A SCIENCE FIRST: DROPPING THE BALL ON HURRICANE INTENSITY
| G01-071 | 10/04/01 | 00:12:41 | Tracking and measuring hurricanes has never been easy but scientists set out to do just that by flying into and above the hurricane. For the first time, researchers were able to utilize specialized high-flying planes to drop temperature-taking instruments
into the hurricane from about 3 miles above it. The resulting map could go a long way to explain hurricane intensification and improve warnings and forecasts.
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TAPE CONTENTS: |
| ITEM (1): DROPSONDES AWAY! -Described by a researcher as "Pringles cans with parachutes", sensors called 'dropsondes' were dropped into Hurricane Erin to gain temperature, pressure, moisture and wind readings throughout different locations in the hurricane. Eight dropsondes could be delivered from above the hurricane with the ER-2 while the fully-staffed DC-8 plane dropped as many as 15 dropsondes within the hurricane.
Courtesy: NASA
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| ITEM (2): What is a Hurricane Anyway? - Hurricanes are tropical storms with winds that have reached a constant speed of 74 mph or more. The winds blow in a large spiral around a calm center known as the "eye", which can be 20-30 miles wide and the storm can extend outward 400 miles. The storm surge is the most destructive aspect; ocean levels can rise up to 33 feet and sweep over the coastline destroying structures, roads and beaches.
This year has been relatively quiet for hurricanes - at the peak of the season (during CAMEX), only two hurricanes were spotted. Shown here are some of the most destructive hurricanes in recent years including the 1998 Hurricane Bonnie whose clouds measured 59,000 ft into the sky from the eyewall (seen here by the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM). Hurricane Mitch was responsible for over 9,000 deaths in 1998. This
image is from the GOES-8 weather satellite.
Courtesy:NASA / NASDA/NOAA
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| ITEM (3): Field Subjects: The Hurricanes - Hurricanes Erin and Humberto became the unwitting subjects of CAMEX experiments. Hurricane Erin, shown first, started out the Atlantic hurricane season on September 8. A category-three hurricane, it skirted by Bermuda, moved east and then northeast before dissipating off the Newfoundland coast. The Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra spacecraft saw it on Sept. 9, 2001.
This insider view of Hurricane Humberto was acquired by the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) on Sept. 24, 2001. Humberto became the eighth named storm this year, reaching 105 mph top sustained winds on the 24th but weakening back to a tropical storm on the 27th.
Courtesy: NASA/NASDA
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| ITEM (4): Into The Heart of The Storm - NASA's ER-2 aircraft, a civilian version of the U-2 spy plane, accommodates only a pilot but can fly above the hurricane - 35,000 ft above it! It reaches altitudes of 65,000 ft - high above the atmosphere, forcing pilots to wear space suits. NASA's DC-8 plane is a flying laboratory that fits experiments and passengers. Flying at 35,000
ft, it flies directly into the hurricane forcing pilots to navigate first by sight, second by radar.
Courtesy: NASA
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| ITEM (5): Hurricane Heat Engine - Hurricanes essentially act as engines, drawing energy up from warm tropical ocean waters to power the churning winds. Water vapor from the warm ocean surface evaporates, is forced up into towering covective clouds that surround the eyewall and rainband regions of the storm. As the water vapor cools and condenses from a gas back
to a liquid state it releases latent heat. The release of heat warms the surrounding air, making it lighter and promotes more clouds. Because the hurricane speeds surrounding the eye clouds are often absent from the center of a hurricane, they're thrown out from the center.
Courtesy: NASA
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| ITEM (6): Verfication From Space - CAMEX-4 is focused on the study of hurricane development, tracking intensification and landfall impacts using NASA aircraft and surface remote instruments. Whenever possible, though, scientists compared and validated measurements with observations taken by Earth-orbiting satellites like Terra and the Tropical Rainfall Measuring
Mission (TRMM).
Courtesy: NASA/NASDA
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| ITEM (7): Scientists In The Field - Another experiment required flying a downward-looking radar above the hurricane to measure rain intensity, air speed and velocity within the storm. Combined with the dropsonde experiment, researchers can piece together information about the clouds that create heat and warm the hurricane's spinning vortex with temperature readings that
create clouds and drive the vortex.
The field campaign united researchers from 10 universities, five NASA centers and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Based out of the Naval Air Station at Jacksonville, Fl, it ran from Aug. 16 - Sept. 24.
Courtesy: NASA
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| ITEM (8): Scientist Soundbites
- Jeff Halverson, Assistant Research Professor of Geography,
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Scientist
Courtesy: NASA
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| ITEM (9): Reporter Package
- Hurricanes are one of the most destructive forces on our planet. But now scientists have a brand new way of figuring out how they tick -by flying into and above them. Flying a civilian version of the U-2 spy plane high above the hurricane, researchers drop small temperature-taking sensors into the storm's eye and around it.
As they go down through the atmosphere, they sense the information, they sense the temperature, winds, and moisture, and then they radio that information back up to the airplane where it's captured on a computer. Once we have that data, we can look at the structure of the storm from the cloud top to the ocean surface. Coupled with ground and space-based measurements, scientists are getting a better look at the structure and intensification of hurricanes. For the first time we are able to measure the temperature inside the hurricane and the eyewall of the hurricane from above the cloud tops all the way to the ocean surface. That's never been done before.
The experiment was part of the fourth month-long cooperative campaign called CAMEX
that seeks to improve hurricane forecasting and warnings.
Courtesy: NASA
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Earth Science Gallery