Stormpulse event tracking overlays the location of Gulf of Mexico storms on NASA base imagery. Data include historical tracks, forecast models, wind probabilities, cloud cover, wind fields, buoys, current center location, wind speed, pressure, and movement.
Hurricanes: Powerful Agents Shaping the Coast
Satellite Loop of Hurricane Katrina's Track [Image courtesy of the University of Wisconsin (CIMSS)]
After tropical cyclones in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico make landfall, scientists at the USGS National Wetlands Research Center are poised for many kinds of assessments, from aerial damage reconnaissance to recovery patterns of habitats, in an effort to understand how storms affect coastal wetlands. New studies are addressing how catastrophic events can increase the spread of already troublesome invasive species such as the cactus moth and channeled applesnail. Historical studies include geographic information system mapping of habitats, ecological studies of vegetation and soils, effects of flooding on coastal forests, and effects of storm damage on habitat for birds and other animals.
Click the image to view NOAA's rainbow infrared satellite loop of the Gulf of Mexico. (Requires Java)
Hurricane and Cyclone Current News
ScienceDaily: Hurricane and Cyclone News Hurricane News and Research. Read current events articles on hurricanes, hurricanes and global warming, the effect of La Nina on the 2006 hurricane season and more.
Hurricane Katrina: Why Some People Stayed Behind Hurricane Katrina was the largest natural disaster in US history, claiming the lives of more than 1,800 victims and causing well over $100 billion in damage along the Gulf Coast. The 2005 storm breached every levee in New Orleans, flooding almost the entire city as well as the neighboring parishes. Yet a surprising number of people stayed behind and rode out the storm. ( Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:00:00 EDT )
New Type Of El Nino Could Mean More Hurricanes Make Landfall A new study suggests that the form of El Nino may be changing potentially causing not only a greater number of hurricanes than in average years, but also a greater chance of hurricanes making landfall. ( Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:00:00 EDT )
QuikScat Finds Tempests Brewing In 'Ordinary' Storms "June is busting out all over," as the song says, and with it, U.S. residents along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts begin to gaze warily toward the ocean, aware that the hurricane season is revving up. In the decade since NASA's QuikScat satellite and its SeaWinds scatterometer launched in June 1999, the satellite has measured the wind speed and wind direction of these powerful storms, providing data that are increasingly used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Hurricane Center and other world forecasting agencies. The data help scientists detect these storms, understand their wind fields, estimate their intensity and track their movement. ( Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:00:00 EDT )
The NBII Program is administered by the Biological Informatics Office of the U.S. Geological Survey
