1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Infrared images (above) showed a lake effect cloud band — exhibiting cloud-top infrared brightness temperatures as cold as -49 C (darker shades of orange) — over far southern Lake Michigan that was moving inland across parts of northwest Indiana and northeast Illinois after midnight on 10 November 2025. Air temperatures in the mid-30s F flowing across lake buoy water temperatures of 53ºF created sufficient instability in the marine boundary layer to enhance and sustain these lake effect cloud bands.

Overlays of GLM Flash Extent Density and Flash Points highlighted 3 brief instances of satellite-detected lightning activity — along the coast of Indiana at 0519 UTC, and then along the coast of Illinois (near Chicago) at 0622 UTC and 0642 UTC (below). Note that the GLM Flash Points are parallax-corrected (to match their location at the surface), while the GLM Flash Extent Density gridded product is *not* parallax-corrected (and therefore exhibits a slight NNW displacement in GOES-19 imagery). None of the nearby METAR sites explicitly reported thundersnow or lightning around the times of these GLM signatures.

 

 

Thundersnow in Downtown #Chicago captured by the Chicago Loop Live webcam! This was the first one around 12:23 am #ilwx ????@NWSChicago pic.twitter.com/fBs1C26PDx

— Kaitlyn Jesmonth (@wxkaitlynj) November 10, 2025

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Farther to the north, another lake effect snow band was moving inland across far southeast Wisconsin and extreme northeast Illinois (above). No lightning activity was seen in GLM data with this lake effect cloud band, but it did produce as much as 13.0 inches of snow at Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin (below).

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10-minute Full Disk scan GOES-18 (GOES-West) daytime True Color RGB + nighttime Dust RGB images created using Geo2Grid (above) showed a plume of resuspended volcanic ash (hazy shades of tan in True Color RGB, and shades of violet in Dust RGB) from the 1912 Novarupta-Katmai eruption in Alaska — which was being transported offshore across the Shelikof Strait and over parts of Kodiak Island during 05-07 November 2025. Surface volcanic ash within the Valley Of Ten Thousand Smokes was being lofted by strong northwesterly winds that were being channeled through the valley.

According to this USGS Volcano Notice, the National Weather Service issued a SIGMET advising aviation interests that the maximum height of this resuspended ash was 6000 ft.

Trace amounts of resuspended ash fall were reported at Kodiak on 07 November (below).

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A UPS freight plane crashed on takeoff from UPS’s home base in Louisville, Kentucky on 4 November 2025. The plane was bound for Honolulu, Hawaii, and thus had a significant quantity of fuel on board. Eyewitness videos showed a large fireball as the aircraft hit the ground in an industrial zone around 5:15 local time (2215 UTC) and nearby residents were told to shelter in place and turn off external air handling systems in order to protect themselves from the smoke plume.

Several GOES products are designed to monitor fires, and thus can be applied to this situation as well. the following animation shows Band 7 (3.9 microns) from the GOES-19 Advanced Baseline Imager. This band is a key component of fire detection as it is very sensitive to high temperatures. Even if a small portion of a pixel is actively burning, that will create enough emission at 3.9 microns to be detected by Band 7. The following animation shows Band 7 from 2200-2300 UTC (5:00-6:00 PM local time). The airport is located in the central part of the image due south of the central city. Note the dark spot that rapidly appears starting at 22:20 UTC. This is the signature of the initial fire, and while the hot spot fades quickly, its presence is still detectable from space for some time after.

This is a tricky time of day to use many RGB products, as several of them rely on channels that are only available during the day or use channels whose interpretation change between day and night. Sunset took place just 24 minutes after the crash, and by this time the visible channels had lost their ability to show the surface. However, the fire temperature RGB can be used to detect fires both day and night. This RGB is a combination of the 1.6, 2.2, and 3.9 micron channels. Since these are shortwave channels, they are normally only used during the day as the earth’s natural emission at these wavelengths is negligible. However, fires are hot enough to produce radiant emission at these wavelengths at values that far exceed solar reflectance, and so this product can be used for fire detection 24 hours a day. The fire temperature RGB clearly shows the presence of a fire at the time the plane crashed. However, this signal does not last very long as the initial burst cools and clouds move in to obscure the surface.

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5-minute CONUS Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Microphysics RGB images and Next Generation Fire System (NGFS) Fire Detection polygons (above) displayed a pronounced thermal signature of the UPS Flight 2976 crash-related fire beginning at 2216 UTC (cursor sample) — which became less distinct as it lingered until 0036 UTC. Plots of surface observations showed that the winds were light south-southeasterly at Louisville International Airport.

The south-southeast winds from the crash site fire transported some smoke over Louisville International Airport (KSDF), but this smoke remained aloft (with its base at altitudes of 2600-3200 ft) and the surface visibility remained at 10 statute miles (below).

A longer time series of KSDF surface report data (below) showed that the base of the low-altitude smoke descended from 3200 ft at 2300 UTC to 800 ft at 0800 UTC.

In spite of a much larger viewing angle from the GOES-18 (GOES-West) satellite — 67 degrees, vs 43 degrees from GOES-19 — a thermal signature was also apparent in 10-minute Full Disk scan Microphysics RGB imagery, beginning at 2220 UTC (below). However, the GOES-18 thermal signature dissipated more quickly.

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5-minute CONUS Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Visible images (above) showed a rapidly intensifying Hurricane Force Low (surface analyses) that was approaching Atlantic Canada on 04 November 2025.

Two examples of Metop ASCAT surface scatterometer winds having speed values greater than Category 1 hurricane intensity are shown below.

5-minute GOES-19 Water Vapor images (below) depicted a mid-tropospheric filament of dry air (shades of yellow to orange) that wrapped into the circulation of the storm. Peak wind gusts at METAR sites along the southern coast of Newfoundland included 83 kts at Sagona Island.

A NUCAPS profile within the dry filament showed the depth of very dry air throughout the troposphere (below).

10-minute GOES-19 True Color RGB images (below) revealed an area of water that exhibited a hazy appearance — this was due to enhanced scattering of light off of highly-agitated seas with large waves and abundant sea spray (caused by a localized area of very strong winds).

At 1501 UTC (Visible image | True Color RGB image) this area of hazy-appearing water was located just SSE of Buoy 44139 — where the peak wind gust was 68 kts, the maximum wave height was 31 ft and upwelling (caused by significant wind/wave action) cooled the water temperature by 6.5 degrees F in 6 hours (below).

A Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) image (source) from RCM-1 (below) showed the strong winds (shades of red) around the periphery of the storm center as it was located just south of the Newfoundland coast at 2132 UTC. Note the light wind speeds (shades of cyan to blue) in the vicinity of the storm center.

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