10-minute Full Disk sector GOES-18 (GOES-West) Nighttime Microphysics RGB + daytime True Color RGB images from the CSPP GeoSphere site (above) showed a plume of resuspended ash (from the 1912 Novarupta-Katmai eruption in Alaska) that was being transported offshore across the Shelikof Strait toward Kodiak Island — and wrapping into an eddy circulation within the Strait on 23 April 2023.

The entrainment of resuspended ash within the eddy circulation was more apparent in 1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-18 Nighttime Microphysics + daytime True Color RGB images (below).

1-minute GOES-18 Dust RGB images (below) include plots of surface/buoy/ship reports and GOES-18 Derived Motion Winds — note how the wind direction at Shelikof Strait Buoy 46077 changed as the eddy circulation developed. Derived Motion Winds indicated that portions of the offshore resuspended ash plume were moving at speeds up to 20 knots.

A toggle between GOES-18 Dust RGB and Topography images (below) showed that the plume was emerging from the ash-filled Valley Of Ten Thousand Smokes.

Since this particular plume was composed of a mixture of aged ash and more recent sediment from glacial melt (rather than purely fresh volcanic ash), the Dust RGB did a better job at highlighting the plume — as seen in a comparison of Ash RGB and Dust RGB images at 1500 UTC and 1600 UTC (below). Although the two RGBs use the same spectral bands, they are scaled differently (in order to better depict typical ash or dust features).

RCM-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) winds (source) at 1646 UTC (below) revealed the area of lighter wind speeds (darker shades of blue) within the eddy circulation over the Shelikof Strait.

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April 22, 2023: Happy Earth Day! The first Earth Day was celebrated on April 22, 1970. The idea was conceived by then Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson and an estimated 20 million Americans participated on that first day, which was approximately 10% of the US population back then. You can read more about the first Earth Day celebration on the Nelson Institute’s web page: Tracing Earth Day’s Origins.

Earth Day is a great excuse for us to show off some true color imagery from GOES! In case anyone forgot, you live on a beautiful planet! Do what you can to help keep it that way. Here’s a selfie of almost everyone in North and South America today at 17:00 UTC from GOES-16 (GOES-East) ABI:

If you weren’t in that view, maybe you’re in this next one from GOES-18 (GOES-West) today at 21:00 UTC?

I am attempting to get everyone in this next image. Unless you were off planet or in the Arctic or Antarctic Circle, you must be somewhere in this next image. A true color, local-noon composite from five geostationary imagers, thanks to the SSEC Satellite Data Services (SDS), here you are:

Back in 2020, @GOESguy on Twitter shared this loop, starting with the first Earth Day in 1970 and every 10 years to 2020:

Here's a similar look of geostationary images on #EarthDay over the decades (1970 to 2020): https://t.co/Pe841I1Ftn Thanks to @NASAEarth @NOAASatellites @UWSSEC etc. Loop: https://t.co/GCId6O16Xr #Earthwx https://t.co/vr5f3eVKVV pic.twitter.com/GHZO9HhPCX

— Tim Schmit (@GOESguy) April 22, 2020

The animation with some controls is on this web page. Or for the mp4, click here.

Or just for the Tweet on the first Earth Day in 1970, as seen by ATS III, here’s another @GOESguy tweet from 2022. Earth Day was started by a Wisconsinite (Nelson) and so was geostationary satellite meteorology (Vern Suomi). We continue to follow in these giant’s footsteps at both the Nelson Institute and SSEC.

Happy #EarthDay 2022. A @NASAEarth ATS-III Spin Scan Cloud Camera #geostationary image from 1970! More https://t.co/80Fzh4zHcK or https://t.co/TOpDCDkvIi or https://t.co/7tvc4Syk3K (@UWMadison @UW_AOS / @UWSSEC Vern Suomi was the Principal Investigator). @NOAASatellites @UWCIMSS pic.twitter.com/tTyOiUQZYP

— Tim Schmit (@GOESguy) April 22, 2022

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5-minute CONUS sector GOES-16 (GOES-East) True Color RGB images from the CSPP GeoSphere site (above) showed the northward transport of smoke from the 35,000-acre Great Lake Fire in eastern North Carolina on 21 April 2023.

In a closer view using 1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-16 True Color RGB images (below), intermittent brighter white pyrocumulus clouds were seen in the immediate vicinity of the fire source.

1-minute GOES-16 Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm) and Day Land Cloud Fire RGB images along with the Fire Power and Fire Temperature derived products (below) showed thermal signatures of the fire (the Fire Power and Fire Temperature products are components of the Fire Detection and Characterization Algorithm). 3.9 µm infrared brightness temperatures occasionally reached 137.71ºC (the saturation temperature of GOES-16 ABI Band 7 detectors), as early as 1524 UTC and as late as 2143 UTC.

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The mp4 animation above shows the development of Tropical Storm Sanvu out of the Monsoon Trough in the western Pacific ocean on 19-20 April 2023. The ‘Pacific Tropical Airmass RGB’ used in the animation is described in this blog post, and it gives more information about cloud-top features compared to the Airmass RGB (a similar mp4 animation for the airmass RGB is here). An interesting (and suggestive) aspect of the animation is the development of strong outflow to the north of the Monsoon Trough after 18 April that continues through the end of the animation.

MIMIC Total Precipitable Water fields — that incorporate wind information from the GFS — also show the development of a circulation as the system develops. Note that the storm is near the northern edge of the moist trough; the abundant dry air to its north might affect the future strength of the system.

Gridded NUCAPS fields (source) can also give views of the environment that contains the developing tropical cyclone. The three toggles below show the evolution from ca. 0300 UTC on 19 April through ca. 0230 UTC on 21 April 2023. Mid-level Total (850-700mb) Precipitable Water, Relative Humidity at 700 mb, and the 850-700 mb Lapse Rate all testify to the hostile environment (dry and stable) to the north of this developing system.

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Diagnostics from the SSEC/CIMSS Tropical Weather website for the storm, below, show the system forecast to move towards a region where higher shear now exists.

SATCON diagnostics from CIMSS, above, show that an initial period of strengthening has leveled off.The forecast from the Joint Typhoon Warning Center takes Sanvu towards the southern Marianas islands as a system with weak winds (but likely abundant moisture), as shown below.

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More information on this system is available at the webpages of the National Weather Service in Guam (link).

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