Satellite Loops of Tropical Cyclones

These loops were all created by me, and anyone may feel free to link to or use them, but I'd appreciate that credit is given (Brian McNoldy, Univ of Miami).
The current Geosynchronous Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) Series is capable of producing 1-km resolution visible images every minute, resulting in an immense dataset which can be used to study convective cloud tops as well as transient low-level cloud swirls in the eye. Simple barotropic computer models have shown that vorticity redistribution in the core of a TC can result in the formation of local vorticity maxima, or mesovortices. The models have also suggested that this process is responsible for polygonal eyewalls and in some instances, rapid intensification. Satellite imagery has proven valuable in the validation of the model results.

• Hurricane Igor 2010
  • FLASH (13Sep VIS, 38.0 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Alex 2010
  • FLASH (30Jun-1Jul VIS, 42.5 Mb)
  • FLASH (30Jun-1Jul IR, 18.1 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Rick 2009
  • FLASH (17Oct VIS, 9.6 Mb)
  • FLASH (18Oct VIS, 8.9 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Dolly 2008
  • FLASH (23Jul VIS/IR, 16.9 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Katrina 2005
  • FLASH (28Aug VIS, 35.7 Mb)
  • FLASH (29Aug VIS, 18.5 Mb)
  • FLASH (28Aug-29Aug IR, 40.5 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Michelle 2001
  • JAVASCRIPT (2Nov VIS, 17.1 Mb)
  • GIF ANIMATION (2Nov VIS, 16.5 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Juliette 2001
  • JAVASCRIPT (25Sep VIS, 6.8 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (26Sep VIS, 7.1 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Erin 2001
  • JAVASCRIPT (9Sep VIS, 4.5 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (10Sep VIS, 4.4 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Gil and Tropical Storm Henriette 2001
  • JAVASCRIPT (6Sep-7Sep VIS, 13.5 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (7Sep-8Sep VIS, 13.6 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (8Sep-9Sep VIS, 13.0 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (9Sep-10Sep VIS, 12.7 Mb)
  
  
• Mozambique Channel Cyclone 2001
  • JAVASCRIPT (20Jun-22Jun VIS, 4.5 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Isaac 2000
  • JAVASCRIPT (28Sep VIS, 4.9 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Daniel 2000
  • MPEG (25Jul VIS, 1.2 Mb)
  • MPEG (25Jul IR, 1.2 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (25Jul VIS, 47.4 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Alberto 2000
  • JAVASCRIPT (11Aug VIS, 2.4 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (12Aug VIS, 2.7 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Lenny 1999
  • JAVASCRIPT (17Nov VIS, 3.8 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (14Nov-18Nov IR, 34.7 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Floyd 1999
  • JAVASCRIPT (12Sep VIS, 16.7 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (12Sep IR, 4.2 Mb)
  • AVI (12Sep VIS, 34.2 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (13Sep VIS, 16.2 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (13Sep IR, 4.4 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (14Sep VIS, 15.9 Mb)
  • JAVASCRIPT (14Sep IR, 5.0 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Bret 1999
  • JAVASCRIPT/GIF (19-22Aug VIS)
  • JAVASCRIPT (22Aug VIS, 1.5 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Mitch 1998
  • JAVASCRIPT (26Oct VIS, 3.7 Mb)
  
  
• Hurricane Luis 1995
  • QUICKTIME (06Sep VIS, 12.6 Mb)
  
  

View a poster (AGU Fall Meeting, Dec 2000) entitled "A Preliminary Observational Study of Hurricane Eyewall Mesovortices" by B. D. McNoldy and T. H. Vonder Haar.

View a paper (Monthly Weather Review, Dec 2002) entitled "Vortical Swirls in Hurricane Eye Clouds" by J. P. Kossin, B. D. McNoldy, and W. H. Schubert.

View a paper (Monthly Weather Review, Feb 2003) entitled "A Classification of Binary Tropical-cyclone-like Vortex Interactions" by R. Prieto, B. D. McNoldy, S. R. Fulton, and W. H. Schubert.

View a paper (Bulletin of the Amer. Met. Soc., Nov 2004) entitled "Triple Eyewall in Hurricane Juliette" by B. D. McNoldy.

View a paper (Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, Jan 2006) entitled "Rapid Filamentation Zones in Intense Tropical Cyclones" by C. M. Rozoff, W. H. Schubert, B. D. McNoldy, and J. P. Kossin.

Created & Maintained by Brian McNoldy