Historic 2020 Atlantic Hurricane Season Is Not Done: Hurricane Delta Aims for the U.S. Gulf Coast
The historic 2020 Atlantic hurricane season is not done yet. Hurricane Delta, the 25th named storm of the season, is expected to make landfall on…
Earth Observatory News
Monstrous Thunderstorms Rumble Over the Great Plains
During the summer, the U.S. Great Plains routinely experiences nighttime thunderstorms unlike anywhere else in the country. These large-scale storms—sometimes spanning entire states—account for more…
Coloring the Great Salt Lake – Astronaut Takes Beautiful Photograph From Space Station
While passing over northern Utah, an astronaut onboard the International Space Station (ISS) captured this photograph of an eastern portion of the Great Salt Lake….
California’s Nightmare Fire Season Continues – See NASA’s Latest Satellite Images
After a brief lull, a late-September heat wave reinvigorated California’s already brutal 2020 fire season. The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the NOAA-20…
Bobcat Fire Scorches Southern California – One of the Largest Fires on Record for Los Angeles County
After burning more than 180 square miles (460 square kilometers) of the San Gabriel Mountains in September 2020, the Bobcat fire now ranks among the…
Arctic Sea Ice Reaches Second-Lowest Minimum on Record
Arctic sea ice likely reached its annual minimum extent on September 15, 2020, according to researchers at NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data…
Extraordinary Fires Char the Pantanal, a Vast Floodplain in South America
The Pantanal, a vast floodplain in South America, is among the largest wetlands in the world. The mosaic of grasslands, shrublands, forests, marshes, and lakes…
A Meeting of Black Carbon Smoke and Tropical Storms
As large fires on the U.S. West Coast lofted vast plumes of smoke high into the atmosphere in September 2020, satellites and models tracked the…
Historic Fires Devastate the U.S. Pacific Coast – Scientists at a Loss for Words to Describe the Scope and Intensity
Climate and fire scientists have long anticipated that fires in the U.S. West would grow larger, more intense, and more dangerous. But even the most…
Massive Wall of Smoke on U.S. West Coast – Easily Visible From 1 Million Miles Away From Earth
Wildfires continue to rage in the western United States. On September 9, 2020, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured this…
More, Longer, Hotter: California Heatwave Fits a Trend
In early September 2020, an intense heatwave broke temperature records in several locations in Southern California. The dry, hot conditions helped fuel new and existing…
Intense Heat, Winds, and Drought Fuel Smoky Infernos Across Western United States
Intense heat, winds, and drought have fueled smoky infernos in the western United States. Though serious fires burned in California and other western states for…
Super Typhoon Haishen Bears Down on the Korean Peninsula
Super Typhoon Haishen is poised to hit the Korean Peninsula this weekend, making it the third typhoon to encounter the peninsula in just two weeks….
Massive Clouds of Smoke From California Wildfires Blow Over the Pacific Ocean
In the late morning of September 2, 2020, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite acquired this natural-color image of smoke from…
Relentless Wildfires Across Northern California Leave Vast Burn Scars
After more than a week, the seemingly relentless wildfires across Northern California appeared to be waning and better controlled thanks to lighter winds, lower air…
NASA Watches a Dangerous Storm Nearing the Gulf Coast
Government meteorologists issued unusually dire warnings as a large hurricane neared the U.S. Gulf Coast on August 26, 2020. After rapidly strengthening as it passed…
Wildfires Rage – Smoke Continues to Spread Across the U.S. West
On August 21, 2020, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer on NASA’s Terra satellite captured natural-color imagery of smoke plumes from wildfires in California and other…
Beguiling Phytoplankton Bloom in the Baltic Sea Looks Incredible
Nearly every summer, colorful blooms of phytoplankton flourish in the Baltic Sea. And nearly every summer, satellite images detect art-like patterns as the phytoplankton trace…
