Japan successfully launched the Himawari-9 satellite from the Tanegashima Space Center (near the southern tip of Tanegashima in the Osumi Islands south of Kyushu), a back-up to Himawari-8, shortly after 3:20 PM local time (0620 UTC) on 2 November 2016 (News Link 1, 2, 3, 4). Images showing all 16... Read More
Super Typhoon Megi (20W) made landfall on the island of Taiwan as a Category 4 storm (CIMSS SATCON) on 27 September 2016, as seen on JMA Himawari-8 Visible (0.64 µm) and Infrared Window (10.4 µm) images (above; also available as a 69 Mbyte animated GIF). It is interesting to note the blossoming... Read More
Rapid-scan (2.5-minute interval) Himawari-8 AHI Visible (0.64 µm) and Infrared Window (10.4 µm) images (above; also avialable as a 33 Mbyte animated GIF) showed the pin-hole eye and cold cloud-top IR brightness temperatures (-80º C and colder, violet color enhancement) associated with Super Typhoon Meranti (16W) in the Philippine Sea on... Read More
Typhoon Lionrock (12W) in the West Pacific Ocean briefly intensified to Category 4 during the northeastward motion segment of its rather unusual track (above) — the intensity estimate from the Advanced Dvorak Technique peaked at 112.4 knots from 2140 UTC on 26 August to 0630 UTC on 27 August (plot | text).During this... Read More
