Posted by JAC on 3/5/2009, 3:56 pm

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/mtsat/flt/t1/loop-ft.html If there's one thing the Queensland region of Australia doesn't want, it's a tropical cyclone. In the beginning of February, Cyclone Ellie made landfall and brought flooding rains with her. Now Hamish threatens more rainfall for that northeastern region of the country as a landfall is expected south of the town of Cairns on March 7. The infrared imagery of the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite is used to identify the cloud temperatures in tropical cyclones, but it also showed a strengthening storm. It captured this image of Hamish on Mar. 5 at 3:53 Zulu Time (Mar. 4 at 10:53 p.m. EST). Animated infrared satellite imagery (such as from AIRS) and a Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) image from the Defense Meteorological Satellite show a rapidly consolidating system with significantly improving deep convective banding wrapping into a defined low-level circulation center. In the storm's clouds, the lowest temperatures (in purple) are associated with high, cold cloud tops. Those temperatures are as cold as or colder than 220 degrees Kelvin or minus 63 degrees Fahrenheit (F). The blue areas are around 240 degrees Kelvin, or minus 27F. The infrared image also shows a large temperature difference between the tops of the clouds in a tropical cyclone and the scorching hot land in east central Australia. On March 5 at 12:00 Zulu Time (7 a.m. EST), Hamish has sustained winds near 30 knots (34 mph). At that time Hamish's center was located near 14.0 degrees south latitude and 146.9 degrees east longitude, about 205 nautical miles north-northeast of Cairns, Australia. Hamish is moving southwestward near 6 knots (7 mph). According to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center, Hamish is in a favorable environment for intensifying. That means weak wind shear (winds that can tear a storm apart), and warm sea surface waters over 28 degrees Celsius (82 degrees F), which power storms. Text credit: Rob Gutro, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center