Hurricane Melissa Pictures and Movies Present the Horrifying Energy of Third Strongest Atlantic Storm Ever

Hurricane Melissa Pictures Reveal a Monster Storm for the Document Books

By Andrea Thompson & Jeanna Bryner edited by Clara Moskowitz

With most sustained winds of 185 miles per hour because it batters the Caribbean island of Jamaica on Tuesday, Hurricane Melissa is a beast of a storm. Satellite tv for pc and different pictures starkly illustrate Melissa’s monstrosity, from its speedy intensification to the sheer energy of the convection at its core. Right here’s an inside take a look at one of many strongest storms to ever make landfall within the Atlantic since recordkeeping started.

Melissa’s chilly cloud tops underscore the storm’s power. The engine on the coronary heart of any tropical cyclone is the convection powered by the temperature distinction between the nice and cozy sea floor and the chilly ambiance on the high of the storm, the place air flows out.

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On October 27 a crew from the Air Pressure’s “Hurricane Hunters,” or 53rd Climate Reconnaissance Squadron, flies by Hurricane Melissa to gather data for the Nationwide Hurricane Heart.

The calm, clear eye of Melissa seems with the “stadium impact” of the clouds within the eye wall—the place the strongest winds are—as seen from the Hurricane Hunters plane.

One other view exhibits Melissa’s central eye, which seems to be like a textbook eye for a robust hurricane.

Lightning flashes within the eye wall of Class 5 Melissa are a marker of how sturdy the storm is. It reached a central stress of 892 millibars, among the many lowest ever recorded within the Atlantic Ocean. It’s tied because the third most intense Atlantic storm with the devastating 1935 Labor Day hurricane.

Hurricane Melissa swirls above the Caribbean Sea in fading daylight on October 26.

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