Dan’s Wild Wild Science Journal

Areas closed to fishing in the Gulf. S.A.R. images from CSTARS at the Univ. of Florida Miami show oil is now in areas still open.

There are several ways of seeing the extent of the oil slick on the water in the Gulf of Mexico. Visible light is just one way. A better way may very well be to use Synthetic Aperture Radar and look at the Gulf in high frequency radio light.

Image from CSTARS. The red line is the approximate border of the area closed to fishing by Federal Government.

The SAR image to the right is courtesy of CSTARS and the European Space Agency.  It shows the oil well.  It also shows the oil has spread to the east of the federal closed to fishing area.

The closed area will likely have to be expanded further eastward and soon. The current closed area is left of a line southward from Pensacola Bay.

There is an SAR on a Canadian Satellite as well and it too shows the oil quite well.

Something to keep in mind, we humans can only see a tiny part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

We call it light.

IR, and C band radio waves are light too though and sometimes you can see things much better in that light than the visible light our eyes have evolved to detect.

NOTE Saturday 5 June: NOAA has now expanded the area closed to fishing and the area mentioned in this post is now included.

NASA Modis image of the oil slick. The southern part is approaching the Gulf Loop Current. Click image for much larger version.

The Gulf Loop current may very well be picking up the oil slick in the Gulf. This would bring the oil down through the Florida Keys and into the Gulf Stream. Eventually passing between Florida and the Bahamas.

NOAA ocean current model showing the Gulf Loop Current. (Brighter blue.)

Oil in this area could cause severe damage to ocean reefs in the Keys and near the Bahamas. The ocean current models show the path of the loop current very well.

This image from the Real Time Ocean Forecast System (RTOFS) is a forecast of the current late Wednesday afternoon. It’s for water about 100 meters beneath the surface. The loop current is at the surface of the Ocean as well.

Although some oil is now being captured, at least 80% of the leak and probably much more is still flowing into the Gulf. Large plumes of oil are now being detected beneath the surface.

Wind forecast near the coasts, based on numerical weather prediction models. (NOAA NWS)

There is a large amount of oil now west of the Miss. Delta. The wind forecast will continue to push it toward areas along the coast as well. In general the slick seems to be spreading out in a North/South direction.

Doppler Velocity image of a deadly tornado in Oklahoma this afternoon. The storm was repsonsible for at least three deaths and millions in damage. The triangle is the location of the strongest wind shear. Blue is wind toward the radar and red is wind away from the radar. One of the most incredible velocity images of a tornado I have seen. Click for full res. WSR88D Doppler Radar at Tinker AFB near OKC,OK.

It’s been a busy month for those of us who forecast weather.  Tracking volcanic ash using upper level wind forecast and using ocean current models to track the growing oil slick in the Gulf. Today it was a little of all three.

Oklahoma was hit by a swarm of tornadoes today. At least 4 are dead. Many people have lost there homes. Cars and large trucks were flipped in the air along I-35 and I-40. With modern technology, I could watch the same radar images that forecasters in Oklahoma were looking at. Large tornadoes show up very well on Doppler radar. Today they were very easy to spot.

In the Hollywood movie “TWISTER” the town of Wakita, Oklahoma is hit by a big tornado. Today, Wakita really WAS hit by a large tornado. See the radar image below.

Hook echo approaching the town of Wakita, Oklahoma. Fortunately, it appears there were no deaths. Warnings DO make a difference!

As for the oil in the Gulf…

NASA Modis view of the oil slick in the Gulf. Taken Monday 10 May.

The slick is noticeably bigger on the NASA Terra satellite images today.

Ocean current models continue to indicate the oil will spread toward Louisiana. There is already oil spreading westward of the Mouth of the Mississippi and Northward onto Dauphin Island in Alabama.

The oil is showing up as gray and a dark color surrounding it in the middle right of the image to the left.

You can click the image and see a much larger version.

Now for the Volcano in Iceland…

It’s still erupting and the only reason air traffic is not snarled, is the upper level winds are blowing it south into the mid Atlantic. If the winds change and start blowing the ash toward Europe again…

Here is a pic from the NASA Terra satellite today.

From NASA Modis sensor on the TERRA satellite. Ckick for full res.

There are several towns in Iceland that have been covered in thick ash from the volcano. That is not getting nearly the coverage that the flight delays are. You have to feel for those folks…

The nearby Katla volcano usually erupts within a few months of it’s neighbor. It’s eruptions are much bigger. MUCH BIGGER.

No sign of that happening…yet…

Dan

NASA MODIS Satellite pass over the Iceland Volcano today. Huge ash cloud visible but it is not being blown toward Europe (as of now at least). Click image for much higher resolution.

The upper level winds are not blowing the ash toward the UK today and that is very good news. If they were, there would be widespread cancellations of flights. The cloud is especially thick.

One way to see the ash is to use a little trick. By looking at the brightness (temp.) difference between two channels on the image, the ash shows up very well. This is an animated gif, and will take awhile to load.

The good news is that late today the eruption has become much quieter and the ash is not as high as earlier.

Geological experts in Iceland are reporting that there are no signs the eruption will end anytime soon.

Sensors on most of the weather satellites are not really designed to see the ash. There has been a lot of work recently to use the available sensors to see as much as possible. The best way to see it is to use LIDAR. This is a form of radar using lasers. The UK Met office has had considerable luck using this from the ground to look at the ash cloud over the UK.

This event and the oil slick in the Gulf highlight the incredible usefulness of using remote sensing instruments in orbit. They pay for themselves many times over. The USA and Europe have fallen behind in putting these sensors on orbital platforms.

The technology is there, we just need to use it.

Here below is the latest view of the oil slick in the Gulf. Keep in mind you are only seeing the heaviest patch of oil. It is much more widespread than it appears.

True colour image from NASA's Aqua satellite. The thickest oil shows up well. It now appears the oil slick has moved west of the mouth of the Mississippi. Click image for much bigger view.

The movement of both the ash and the oil are very dependent on the atmospheric winds. The winds may start blowing the ash back toward Europe next week. The oil is much more difficult to predict…

Dan

NASA’s AQUA satellite made a pass over Nashville and the Gulf at 1850GMT today. (1:50pm Central U.S. summer time).

The flooded rivers around Nashville are clearly evident in the image (see below). Nashville is at the center of the image. Accurate rain gauges from Central Tennessee show a rain event of incredible proportions. Areas around Nashville had over 17 inches of rain in 24 hours. This is more than one third the annual rain for Nashville in one day!

Image of flooded rivers around Nashville (dead center of image). The Grand Ole Opry has water up to the stage. NASA AQUA MODIS image.

A few minutes later the satellite passed over the Gulf and spotted the thickest part of the oil slick. The slick is much bigger than it looks in this image. You are seeing only the thickest part.

Oil slick is visible just SE of the mouth of the Miss. River. (Bottom left of image) From NASA AQUA Satellite at 1850 GMT. Click image for full size.

Ocean currents are driven in a large part by winds and the winds will be picking back up again in 48 hours.

Oil slick forecast from NOAA for 23GMT Wednesday 5 May. (6 pm US Central Summer Time)

Some oil is now likely to be pushed to the WEST of the Mississippi Delta. The forecast of the oil slick for tomorrow at 6 pm CDT shows the oil may very well have arrived at shore along the Delta in Louisiana.

This data is based on ocean models being run by NOAA. These models also take into account the wind.

If the oil continues to leak into the Gulf over a long period, the currents will spread it eastward toward Florida. The gulf loop current will eventually pick it up and take it around Florida and out into the Gulf Stream.

How far it goes depends on how much is leaking and how long it leaks…

Both of those estimates remain very fuzzy.

Dan

PS More info coming soon on the ash from Iceland’s volcano…