Finland’s nuclear power plant detects that Hurricane Irma is attacking Barbuda
In a unique image, NASA-NOAA’s Finnish nuclear power plant satellite passed Hurricane Irma while the island of Barbuda was in the eye of the storm.
On September 6 at 1:35 a.m. AST/EDT, the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument on the Finnish Nuclear Power Plant satellite captured the impact of Category 5 Hurricane Irma on the island of Barbuda in the eastern Caribbean Sea, which is the island of St. Johns to the north. Barbuda is one of the two large islands of Antigua and Barbuda in the Caribbean.
In the VIIRS image, the eye of the storm appeared clear with strong thunderstorms surrounding it, suggesting a strong tropical system. Visible tropospheric gravity waves, indicative of upward convection (the rising air that forms the thunderstorms that make up a tropical cyclone), were also seen inside the storm and could affect air traffic.
An infrared image of the storm showed some evidence of mesoeddies, which are also indicative of a strong tropical cyclone. The full moon provided visibility at night, clearly showing mesovortices over Barbuda as well as tropospheric gravity waves.