Amazing nighttime image of hurricane Isaac from space

[pokerfan]

Early on August 29, 2012, the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite on the Suomi-NPP satellite captured this nighttime view of Hurricane Isaac and the cities near the Gulf Coast of the United States. The image was acquired at 1:57 a.m. local time by the VIIRS "day-night band," which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses light intensification to enable the detection of dim signals. In this case, the clouds of Isaac were lit by moonlight.




Full resolution (2,145px × 2,146p) image at link:
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2345.html

[Auggie]

1. Resembles a Jackson Pollock -- almost!

[pokerfan]

2. made me google

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Pollock

Thanks!

[longship]

3. This makes me proud to be a Suomalainen.

A revolutionary weather satellite not only named after the parent of all weather satellites, but his last name, Vernon E. Suomi is the name of the country of my grandparents birth. What US people call Finland, Suomalainens call Suomi.

Yes, he was a Finn... ahem, a Suomalainen.

[eppur_se_muova]

10. Recognized the word, but didn't know how it got to be the name of a satellite ...

[lastlib]

4. seems to be a LOT of dim bulbs around Tampa....

...even with the cloud cover...

some sort of power drain, maybe?

[JudyM]

13. ... or just a lot of dim bulbs. like to see charlotte from space thurs :) nt

[secondvariety]

5. I can see my house-

kinda. The light pollution is atrocious.

[WCGreen]

6. I can see my mom's house...

[Curmudgeoness]

7. Hurricanes are so massive!

And for a Category 1, this is very well formed. My heart goes out to the people in it's path, but this is an awesome picture. Ain't nature cool?!?!?

[pscot]

8. It looks like another galaxy

[FlaGranny]

9. It does.

Never thought about it that way before. The spiral arms are very much alike.

[BrainMann1]

11. Try watching it

late at night spooky.

[LongTomH]

12. We built that -- American taxpayers -- using 55 years of taxpayer-funded NASA research!

And we saw it, and it was good!