Hurricane Bery was caught by a NOAA satellite making landfall at Carriacou Island, and the sight was terrifying.
NOAA's GOES-16 Captures Hurrican's Landfall in Carriacou Island
Satellites are watching Hurricane Beryl as it lashes the Caribbean island of Carriacou in Grenada with damaging winds and rain. On Monday morning, July 1, the hurricane landed as "an extremely dangerous" Category 4 storm.
Throughout the weekend, NOAA's GOES-East satellite repeatedly took pictures of Beryl in almost real-time, closely monitoring the storm's advancement across the Atlantic. The Windward Islands, which include Grenada, St. Vincent, Martinique, and a collection of smaller islands known as the Grenadines, are a group of islands in the Atlantic's Caribbean Sea. The video was captured from the satellite's position, approximately 22,236 miles (35,785 kilometers) above Earth's equator.
American hurricane hunters reported intense turbulence and frequent lightning. Air Force Reserve, who, over the weekend, flew inside Hurricane Beryl to supply meteorological data that the National Hurricane Center (NHC) could use.
One video shared on X, formerly Twitter, highlighted Bery's landfall on Carriacou Island. It featured a stunning view of the mesovortices swirling in Hurricane Beryl's eye.
NOOA's GOES-16 delivers high spatial and temporal resolution imagery. The "Advanced Baseline Imager" (ABI) sensor is one of the six instruments on the GOES-East satellite that observes the Earth and Sun. It offers pictures of the Earth in visible and infrared light at 16 different wavelengths called bands or channels.
Blue and red are its two visible bands, which are named from where they are on the visible region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The photos would appear blue and red in their natural form, but the colors have been desaturated to resemble grayscale. Since these are "visible" channels, the visuals at night will be dark.
Due to Beryl's strength, some are already wondering if it will intensify to Category 5 or 6. According to CNN, Hurricane Beryl has already strengthened into the earliest Category 5 after leaving the Windward Islands with at least one person dead.
.@NOAA's #GOES16🛰️ caught a stunning view of the mesovortices swirling in #HurricaneBeryl's eye as it made landfall on Carriacou Island today. For the latest on #Beryl, go to https://t.co/bf9oyNUeIP https://t.co/2saKR24rAK pic.twitter.com/bL1ulPa2Wt
— NOAA Satellites - Public Affairs (@NOAASatellitePA) July 1, 2024
ALSO READ: Beryl Intensifies to Category 4 Hurricane With 130 MPH Sustained Winds
Hurricane Beryl Category 5
Hurricanes are classified into five categories. Hurricane Beryl was previously classified as Category 4 because its wind ranged between 131 and 1 55 mph. In this category, the visible signs are plants and trees falling and extensive roofing, windows, and doors deterioration. Tiny houses tend to lose their roof completely. There may also be significant damage to lower levels of buildings along the ocean due to flooding and the beating of waves and debris.
Beryl is already classified as Category 5, the strongest on the scale. Hurricanes that fall under this category have winds higher than 155 mph. Severe damage is expected -- from complete failure of roofs, glass breakage in windows and doors, and small buildings being flipped or blown away. In this category, a widespread evacuation of low-lying residential areas five to 10 miles from the coast is necessary.
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