NASA's latest hurricane science field
campaign began on Sept. 7 when the Global Hawk flew over Hurricane Leslie in
the Atlantic Ocean. HS3 marks the first time NASA is flying Global Hawks from
the U.S. East Coast.
According to Chris Naftel, project
manager of NASA's Global Hawk program at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center,
Edwards Air Base, Calif., the Global Hawk aircraft took off at 7:06 a.m. EDT
and headed for Tropical Depression 14, which at the time of take-off, was still
a developing low pressure area called System 91L.
At 1500 UTC (11 a.m. EDT), Tropical
Depression 14 was located near 16.3 North latitude and 43.1 West longitude,
about 1,210 miles (1,950 km) east of the Lesser Antilles. The depression had
maximum sustained winds near 35 mph. It was moving to the west near 10 mph (17
kmh) and had a minimum central pressure of 1006 millibars.
The National Hurricane Center expects
Tropical Depression 14 to strengthen into a tropical storm over the next 48
hours, and turn to the northwest.
The HS3 mission targets the processes
that underlie hurricane formation and intensity change. The data collected will
help scientists decipher the relative roles of the large-scale environment and
internal storm processes that shape these systems.
HS3 is supported by several NASA centers
including Wallops; Goddard; Dryden; Ames Research Center, Moffett Field,
Calif.; Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.; and the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. HS3 also has collaborations with partners from
government agencies and academia.
HS3 is an Earth Venture mission funded
by NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Earth Venture missions are
managed by NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder Program at the agency's
Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. The HS3 mission is managed by the Earth
Science Project Office at NASA's Ames Research Center.
Rob Gutro
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center,
Greenbelt, Md.
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