Hawk's-Eye View
Scientists' quest to find out why some hurricanes fizzle and others flourish is made difficult for one simple reason: These storms are moving targets. NASA's acquisition of two unmanned Global Hawk aircraft—originally built for the U.S. Air Force—is pushing the boundaries of our ability to run reconnaissance on volatile hurricanes. A satellite overpass lasts only a moment, and manned research aircraft can stay with a storm for a few hours at a time. But the Global Hawks, outfitted with a suite of advanced meteorological instruments, allow scientists to remotely and safely observe hurricanes for more than 20 consecutive hours. This is potentially enough time to capture difficult-to-understand changes in storm intensity. The time-lapse video shows Hurricane Karl as seen from a NASA Global Hawk, flying at about 60,000 feet, during a 25-hour flight on September 16-17, 2010.
Fly along with NASA's remotely operated Global Hawk aircraft as it examines Hurricane Karl.
The Global Hawk makes its first of 20 passes over the eye of Hurricane Karl as the storm moves over the Gulf of Mexico.
More spacious than your typical cockpit: the Global Hawk Operations Center at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in California.
One of NASA's Global Hawks undergoes systems testing before the 2010 GRIP mission to study hurricane formation and intensification.
Before the Global Hawk arrived on the scene, NASA's Terra satellite captured Karl as a Category 2 storm on Sep. 16.
For More Information
See NASA.gov
Credits
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Flight footage courtesy of NASA/Dryden Flight Research Center/David Fratello
Photographs courtesy of NASA/Dryden Flight Research Center/Tony Landis
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Video editor
- Kayvon Sharghi (USRA)
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Writer
- Kathryn Hansen (Wyle Information Systems)
Release date
This page was originally published on Thursday, October 11, 2012.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:52 PM EDT.