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Although originally designed to measure atmospheric water vapor and temperature profiles for weather forecasting, data from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua spacecraft are now also being used by scientists to observe atmospheric carbon dioxide.
This visualization shows Aqua/AIRS mid-tropospheric carbon dioxide from July 2003. Low concentrations, 360 ppm, are shown in blue and high concentrations, 385 ppm, are shown in red. Notice that despite carbon dioxide's high degree of mixing, the regional patterns of atmospheric sources and sinks are still apparent in mid-troposphere carbon dioxide concentrations.
In the southern hemisphere the jet stream flow is more directly West to East, and during the period from July to October the carbon dioxide concentration is enhanced in a belt delineated by the jet stream and lofting of carbon dioxide into the free troposphere by the high Andes is visible in this period. The zonal flow of carbon dioxide around the globe at the latitude of South Africa, southern Australia and southern South America is readily apparent.
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About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
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Resources
Additional formats and stills ›
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get AIRS data
Mass evacuations are underway in the northeastern Australian state of Queensland in anticipation of what forecasters expect will be the largest cyclone ever to hit the continent. Yasi has intensified rapidly and currently has winds gusting up to 295 kilometers per hour (183 mph). It is expected to maintain that intensity-equivalent to a Category Five hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Scale -- until landfall in northeastern Queensland between Cairns and Innisfail during the late evening local time on Feb. 2 (early morning Feb. 2 in the United States).
Shown here is the latest infrared image of Yasi from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite, built and managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. It was taken on Feb. 1, 2011, at 7:17 a.m. PST (10:17 a.m. EST). A distinct eye is visible, and the outer bands of the storm can be seen nearing the Australian coast.
The AIRS data create an accurate 3-D map of atmospheric temperature, water vapor and clouds, data that are useful to forecasters. The image shows the temperature of Yasi's cloud tops or the surface of Earth in cloud-free regions. The coldest cloud-top temperatures appear in purple, indicating towering cold clouds and heavy precipitation. The infrared signal of AIRS does not penetrate through clouds. Where there are no clouds, AIRS reads the infrared signal from the surface of the ocean waters, revealing warmer temperatures in orange and red.
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About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
A large number of wildfires, many of them triggered by powerful lightning storms on June 21, erupted around California over the next several weeks. At their peak, more than 2,000 fires were active, from northern California down to Santa Barbara County. Cumulatively the fires have burned nearly 1,480 square miles (more than 978,000 acres) and destroyed well over 100 homes in what officials have called the largest fire event in California history.
In this animation created with data retrieved by NASA's spaceborne instrument called the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, or AIRS, on NASA's Aqua spacecraft, we visualize the rapid increases in carbon monoxide emitted by fires burning in California in June and July 2008. Only the largest values of carbon monoxide detected by AIRS are shown to highlight the impact of the fires. AIRS primarily observes carbon monoxide in a layer from 2 to 7 kilometers above Earth's surface. Thus, it tends to see where the wind blows the carbon monoxide and not just the smoke directly above the fires. However, many of these intense fires lofted a significant amount of carbon monoxide directly above the fires, making the hotspots also visible to AIRS.
For example, carbon monoxide appears over a fire in Butte County on June 11-14, and over the Piute Fire in Kern County on June 23. The most intense carbon monoxide plumes emanated from the fires in Northern California started by dry lightning on June 20 and 21. The activity of these fires flared again from July 8-10. AIRS can even see the large amount of carbon monoxide from this smoke filling California's Central Valley during both of these episodes and lingering as seen on July 12.
Although the carbon monoxide amounts seen by AIRS are not directly harmful, carbon monoxide along with other chemicals in wildfire smoke can lead to the production of dangerous levels of ozone pollution. Smoke from these fires contributed to severe ozone and particulate pollution in portions of California's Central Valleys during June 22-29 and July 7-10.
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU) sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments can make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-D map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
More information about AIRS can be found at airs.jpl.nasa.gov.
Additional formats and stills ›
Image Credit:
NASA/JPL/Earth Surface Science Group
Clancy leaping around me while taking a break from his crate in the truck this weekend.
Clancy and I spent the weekend at a tracking test, where I had the secretary's job. As we moved around a lot, he sent most of each day in his crate in the truck. When we had free time, I would take him out and play with him to let him get some exercise and enjoy the cold weather. At one time I had my camera and did several bursts of shots to see what I might get of Mr Goofy jumping around!! I put together a collage of his goofiness.
This image was created with data acquired by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder instrument (AIRS) on NASA's Aqua satellite during July 2009. The image shows large-scale patterns of carbon dioxide concentrations that are transported around Earth by the general circulation of the atmosphere. Dark blue corresponds to a concentration of 382 parts per million and dark red corresponds to a concentration of almost 390 parts per million. The northern hemisphere mid-latitude jet stream effectively sets the northern limit of enhanced carbon dioxide. A belt of enhanced carbon dioxide girdles the globe in the southern hemisphere, following the zonal flow of the southern hemisphere mid-latitude jet stream. This belt of carbon dioxide is fed by biogenesis activity in South America (carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere through the respiration and decomposition of vegetation), forest fires in both South America and Central Africa, and clusters of gasification plants in South Africa and power generation plants in south eastern Australia.
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About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
AIRS' global carbon monoxide measurements are important because scientists can monitor the transport of fire emissions around the globe on a daily basis. Previously, carbon monoxide measurements came from satellite instruments that saw only part of the Earth each day or from weather balloons. Prior to AIRS, scientists had to integrate those observations with computer models to infer the day-to-day impact of fire emissions on the atmosphere. AIRS provides daily, global coverage. AIRS also measures some of the key atmospheric gases that affect climate, including ozone, methane, and dust and other aerosols.
Tropospheric CO abundances are retrieved from the 4.67 m region of AIRS spectra as one of the last steps of the AIRS team algorithm. AIRS' 1600 km cross-track swath and cloud-clearing retrieval capabilities provide daily global CO maps over approximately 70% of the Earth.
The streak of red, orange, and yellow across South America, Africa, and the Atlantic Ocean in this animation points to high levels of carbon monoxide, as measured by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument flying on NASA's Aqua satellite. The carbon monoxide primarily comes from fires burning in the Amazon basin, with some additional contribution from fires in southern Africa. The animation shows carbon monoxide transport sweeping east throughout August, September, and October 2005.
More images of this event and an animation can be found on the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio web site.
More information about AIRS can be found at airs.jpl.nasa.gov.
Image credit:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
This image represents the total precipitable water vapor for May, 2009 as observed by AIRS, the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) on NASA's Aqua satellite. It shows the total amount of water vapor present in the atmospheric column above each point of the Earth's surface. If all the water vapor in the column were forced to fall as rain, the depth of the resulting puddle on the surface at that point is equal to the value shown on the map. Fifty millimeters is about 2 inches. The water vapor measured above the Antarctic is not shown (black color), since the elevation there is generally very high and the water vapor content extremely low—so low that the color scale would have to be “stretched” to show any details, which would reduce the details for the rest of the globe.
The large area of maximum water vapor in the neighborhood of the equator is the Intertropical Convergence Zone or ITCZ, a region of strong convection and powerful thunderstorms. It is particularly intense in a region around the Philippines and Indonesia called the warm pool. The air’s ability to contain moisture Is related to its temperature—the higher the air temperature, the more moisture can be contained before it must condense and fall out as rain. This image confirms that, as one would expect, the greatest amounts of moisture occur in the tropics. At extremely cold temperatures the atmosphere can hold very little water vapor, which is reflected by the strong correspondence between light brown dry areas of this map and cold areas in temperature maps. Very low precipitable water vapor occurs because the air is dry, such as over deserts. But because of the temperature relationship, most of the “column water vapor” is contained in the lowest portion of the atmosphere, and when a high mountain makes it impossible to measure down to sea level, the total is much smaller. Mountain regions therefore appear to be abnormally dry. That is sometimes true but not always - sometimes it just reflects the fact that the “measurement column” has been cut off by the mountain.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
AIRS' global carbon monoxide measurements are important because scientists can monitor the transport of fire emissions around the globe on a daily basis. Previously, carbon monoxide measurements came from satellite instruments that saw only part of the Earth each day or from weather balloons. Prior to AIRS, scientists had to integrate those observations with computer models to infer the day-to-day impact of fire emissions on the atmosphere. AIRS provides daily, global coverage. AIRS also measures some of the key atmospheric gases that affect climate, including ozone, methane, and dust and other aerosols.
Tropospheric CO abundances are retrieved from the 4.67 m region of AIRS spectra as one of the last steps of the AIRS team algorithm. AIRS' 1600 km cross-track swath and cloud-clearing retrieval capabilities provide daily global CO maps over approximately 70% of the Earth.
The streak of red, orange, and yellow across South America, Africa, and the Atlantic Ocean in this animation points to high levels of carbon monoxide, as measured by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument flying on NASA's Aqua satellite. The carbon monoxide primarily comes from fires burning in the Amazon basin, with some additional contribution from fires in southern Africa. The companion animation shows carbon monoxide transport sweeping east throughout August, September, and October 2005.
More images of this event and an animation can be found on the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio web site.
More information about AIRS can be found at airs.jpl.nasa.gov.
Image credit:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
En téléférique, suspendus dans les airs, au dessus du Cañón del Chicamocha. | Hanging high above the ground in a teleferic, crossing the Chicamocha Canyon. | En teleferico, suspendidos en el aire, atravesando el Cañon del Chicamocha.
D-AIRS 'Husum' / A321-131 cn.595 / LH 1703 rollt in MUC nach der Landung auf 08R aus Sofia-Vrazhdebna (SOF) Bulgarien zum Terminal 2.
Royal Air Force No.216 Squadron Lockheed Tristar KC.1 ZD948 gracefully trundles out to depart on an Air-to-Air Refuelling task at RAF Brize Norton on 19th March 2014.
Later that day, sister ship ZD953 made her last flight to oblivion over at Bruntingthorpe where the remainder of the fleet are due by the end of March.
A sad end to such a lovely looking aeroplane.
With the demise of the VC-10's and now the Tristars, the skies will be the poorer for their loss.
AristoMedia Puts Artists Front and Center with Inaugural Center Stage Party
Artists Amber Hayes (FUNL Music), Ashley Gearing (Curb Records), Daisy Mallory (FrontWater Records), DJ Miller (Evergreen Records), Rachel Holder (All Entertainment), and Ty Herndon (FUNL Music) each performed a 15-minute set. Hosting duties were handled by The Country Vibe’s Chuck Long and Becca Walls.
The AristoMedia Group hosted a first time event featuring performances from six talented singer/songwriters on Monday, Nov. 8, at the world-renowned The Stage on Broadway in downtown Nashville, TN.
Entitled the Aristo Center Stage Party, the event highlighted a cross section of talent in a semi-acoustic setting. Plans are in place for this to become an annual event.
Hosting duties were handled by The Country Vibe’s Chuck Long and Becca Walls, who are seen regularly on the nationally and internationally syndicated show, which airs in Nashville weekly on the CW network (WNAB-TV).
“Nashville has so many great new and established singer/songwriters. We feel that our inaugural Center Stage Party is a great way to cap off the year in which AristoMedia celebrates its 30th Anniversary and share some great music with some of the many people who are coming to the city to participate in the CMA Awards week activities” stated AristoMedia President Jeff Walker.
The timing of the event is set to coincide with the numerous activities surrounding the CMA Awards week.
Musical supervisor for the event is well known Australian transplant producer, Mark Moffat. Event coordinator is AristoMedia’s Matt Watkins.
ABOUT The Artists:
Amber Hayes is a rising Country singer/songwriter and an accomplished theater performer (her credits include a leading role as Kathy Twitty in the acclaimed Conway Twitty musical, It’s Only Make Believe). She released her debut EP in August 2010, visiting more than 70 radio stations across the country during her radio tour. The first single, “C’mon,” has continued to move up the charts and is currently approaching Top 40 status on Music Row. Signed to FUNL Music earlier this year, Hayes celebrated the album release with a live broadcast on legendary WSM at the famed Station Inn in Nashville. Visit www.AmberHayesMusic.com for more information.
Ashley Gearing signed to Curb Records on her 16th birthday, but elected to finish high school before making the move to Nashville and pursuing her career in recording and songwriting full-time. Now, at 19, she is recording her Curb debut, which features the current radio single, “What You Think About Us,” produced by veteran producer Byron Gallimore (Faith Hill, Tim McGraw, Jo Dee Messina). The video is receiving airplay on television at GAC and online at CMT.com. Visit www.AshleyGearing.com for more information.
Daisy Mallory – FrontWater Records’ Daisy Mallory is a 17-year-old singer/songwriter whose EP, Girl Time, produced a single earlier this year called “Do You Think of Me?” The video received placement at GAC and GACTV.com, as well as CMT Pure and Yahoo.com. She is preparing to release her next single, “Don’t Grow Up Too Fast (If I Had a Little Sister).” Earlier this year, she performed alongside Reba McEntire, David Foster, Glenn Frey and Kris Kristofferson at Muhammad Ali’s Celebrity Fight Night event. For more information about Daisy, visit www.DaisyMallory.com
DJ Miller - DJ Miller is developing a reputation as not only a Country music singer, but also as an entertainer. This 21-year-old from Idaville, Indiana, is known to jump off stage in the middle of his shows to run through the crowd, interact with the audience and even sing love songs to some of his female fans. His debut single for Evergreen Records, “A Little Naughty Is Nice,” was released earlier this summer. The follow-up single is entitled “A Snowman in Birmingham” and is at radio now. Visit www.DJMillerCountry.com for more information.
Rachel Holder – Eighteen-year-old Rachel Holder is currently recording her debut album for All Entertainment, to be released in early 2011. The project’s first single (due early next year) is the catchy “Chocolate,” produced by industry veteran and hit producer Chuck Howard. Holder has also released a special holiday single and video for “Christmas Eve,” which is now available at iTunes and Amazon.com. Her upcoming album will feature several self-penned songs. Visit www.RachelHolder.com for more info about this rising young artist.
Ty Herndon’s career has produced sales of more than 4 million albums and multiple No. 1s on the Country charts, including “What Mattered Most,” “Living in a Moment” and “It Must Be Love.” Herndon’s latest project, released through FUNL Music, is a faith-based Country album titled Journey On. The title track was recently selected for an upcoming public awareness campaign to help fight ALS, spearheaded by former NFL player Kevin Turner, who suffers from the disease. The video for the campaign was recently shot at Nashville’s LP Field. Visit www.TyHerndon.net for more information.
ABOUT The Hosts:
Chuck Long – Chuck Long began his hosting career at the age of 19 while a student at the University of Texas, fronting a music show called Backstage Country. Shortly after college, Long moved to Los Angeles and quickly found hosting gigs covering the entertainment scene. He also had hosting stints on the USA Network, Nickelodeon and Financial News Network. It was his love of country music that prompted Long to create, produce and host Chuck’s Country. At the time, Chuck’s Country was the City of Angel’s sole local country music television show. Chuck’s Country gained national exposure with a series of specials on CMT. After a three year run in Los Angeles, Jim Owens Entertainment brought the show to Nashville where it kicked into high gear with a daily, three-hour live edition. After its Nashville run ended, a new version, Chuck’s Country Lightning went nationwide once more as one of the Americana Network’s cornerstone shows. Long is a popular personality in Nashville, thanks to his hosting stints on the WB’s Mornings, The Americana Network’s Americana Digest and Writer’s Notes, correspondent duties on the syndicated television show Crook and Chase and the Shop at Home Network, where he served as a Senior Host. Long currently hosts entertainment segments on Nashville’s WTVF-NewsChannel 5+. An accomplished actor, Long has a substantial resume of film, television and theatre roles.
Becca Walls - Becca Walls started as an intern at 102.7 KIIS-FM in Los Angeles In 1991. She was promoted to afternoon producer and then in 1993 helped start the nationally syndicated radio show After MidNite with Blair Garner. There she was the producer and co-host of the show for four years. In 1997 Walls moved to Nashville, where she worked as a Nashville correspondent for numerous outlets. She did interviews with artists, attended events and reported on all the happenings in country music. In May 2000 she landed the midday position at Nashville’s country station 103 WKDF. In addition to doing middays in Nashville, in March of 2010 Becca became the Nashville-based co-host of WAXX 104.5’s morning show in Eau Claire, WI. She also continues to be a Nashville correspondent and does country music news reports on radio stations across the U.S.
ABOUT The Country Vibe:The Country Vibe with Chuck and Becca, hosted by industry veterans Chuck Long and Becca Walls, features a mix of the latest news from Music City as well as interviews with today’s hit makers, future stars and country music legends. The series originates from ground zero of Nashville’s Honky Tonk scene, the legendary The Stage nightclub on Lower Broadway. The CW-Nashville (WNAB; Comcast Ch. 18) is the Nashville home for The Country Vibe with Chuck and Becca. The show airs Saturdays at 10:30 p.m. in the channel’s country-tv block, along with Crook & Chase at 9 p.m. and Inside Music Row at 10 p.m. The Country Vibe airs internationally in the United Kingdom on The Showcase Channel on Sky 201 & Freesat 403. Distribution to 10.5million homes in the UK, with millions more inside satellite footprint tuning in from Ireland & Europe. Air times are Sundays/Mondays 7:30pm; Tuesdays/Saturdays 1:30am. The combined number of households for The Country Vibe’s second season is 62 million.
The Pepsi Skywriter is one of more than 1,200 Travel Air open-cockpit biplanes built between 1925 and 1930. Travel Airs were popular and rugged aircraft that earned their keep as utility and record-breaking workhorses and saw service around the country as crop dusters, barnstormers, and as private planes for the sportsman pilot. For 40 years, pilots flew the Pepsi Skywriter across the United States for the Pepsi-Cola Company delivering a unique form of advertising known as skywriting.
Three future giants in the aircraft industry, Lloyd Stearman, Walter Beech, and Clyde Cessna, came together as young aviation enthusiasts in Wichita, Kansas, to build the Travel Air. During 1923 and 1924, Stearman and Beech worked at the Swallow Aeroplane Manufacturing Company as chief designer and vice president/test pilot respectively. The Swallow aircraft met with success, but Stearman and Beech lobbied to try a design with a steel tube, instead of wood, framework. When management declined, Stearman, Beech, and William Snook left Swallow to start their own company, and brought in Clyde Cessna, a successful farmer who liked to build airplanes. They incorporated the Travel Air Manufacturing Company in January 1925 and immediately designed a three-place, open-cockpit, fabric-covered biplane with a Curtiss OX-5 90 hp engine. Stearman had the steel for the tubing tested to his satisfaction at the Agronomy Department at Kansas State Agricultural College, as there were no aviation standards yet in place. Steel tubing braced the cockpit and steel wires braced the fabric-covered spruce spar wings and ribs. Steel was also used for the rudder and elevator leading and trailing edges, and the horizontal stabilizer leading edge, while the vertical stabilizer was spruce. Spruce strips were used to fair the outside of the fuselage and the turtledeck was spruce. Beech wanted redundant control cables running from the cockpit back to two elevators control horns. The landing gear was a standard duralumin speader bar between vees with bungee shockcords.
Travel Air #1 had a striking look with its fully enclosed cowling for the OX-5 engine, balanced ailerons on the upper wing that overlapped around the edge of the wing, and a blue fuselage with silver wings. Ira Beach made the first test flight on March 13, 1925. Travel Airs performed well in the 1925 Ford Reliability Tour and National Air Transport purchased a Model B for its airmail contract work. OX-5 A and B models became Model 2000s in March 1928 with ATC number 30. The Wright J-4 and J-5, significant radial engines that dramatically improved the performance and reliability of aircraft, were then offered on the airframe and, after 1928, those aircraft became the Model 4000. The 4000 found popularity with better performance and versatility through a wide variety of engine, wing, passenger seat, and landing gear combinations. The Speed wing, for example, was a shorter wing with a new airfoil that made the aircraft faster and required a recertification of the airplane to a D-4000. Ted Wells, later the designer of Beech's Staggerwing, owned the first D-4000 that also sported the first NACA cowl built by Travel Air. By early 1927, both Stearman and Cessna had left Travel Air, leaving Walter Beech in charge, and the newest Travel Air was a cabin monoplane. In 1929, Beech allowed the large Curtiss-Wright Company to absorb the company as a division, but it could not survive the depression, and closed in September 1932.
In 1929, NC434N, serial number 1340, was built as an E-4000, meaning it had a J-6-5 engine and most likely B wings (not the original "elephant ear wing). The D4D model officially arrived in February 1930 with a Wright J-6-7 (Wright R-760-ET) 240 hp engine (the second "D" in D4D) that improved the cruising speed to 110 mph with a range of 520 miles, and the aircraft's ceiling rose to 14,000 feet. N434N received the Speed wings and J-6-7 engine in 1930 and was recertificated as a D4D. Andy Stinis, of the Skywriting Corporation of America, purchased the aircraft in 1931 and flew it out of Floyd Bennett Field, Long Island, New York.
Skywriting, defined as the process of writing a name or message with smoke from an aircraft against a blue sky, began in England after World War I, the brainchild of Major John C. Savage, RAF. His first successful demonstration was at the Derby at Epsom Downs, in May 1922, when Captain Cyril Turner wrote "Daily Mail" above the track. Turner then came to the United States in October 1922 and wrote "Hello U.S.A." above New York City. Allan J. Cameron, along with Leroy Van Patten established the Skywriting Corporation of America at Curtiss Field, an American branch of the Savage's original company. They acquired the patents for mixing the writing gas the United States, and, although it was nothing more than light oil fed through the exhaust system, they controlled the market for years. In 1923, using the Skywriting Corporation, the American Tobacco Company launched the first and very successful skywriting advertising campaign for Lucky Strike cigarettes. Pepsi-Cola Corporation became one of the longest-running contractors of skywriting; in the late 1930s and mid 1940s, it contracted or owned a total of 14 aircraft. In 1940 alone, it contracted for 2,225 writings over 48 states. Andy Stinis flew for Pepsi-Cola from 1931 to 1953.
In 1973 Alan Pottasch and Jack Strayer of Pepsi began a search for old skywriters and found N434N still with Andy Stinis. They intended to display it at the Pepsi corporate headquarters in Purchase, New York, however, Strayer, a former skywriter, soon persuaded Pepsi to install navigation and communications equipment and tour it once again. In 1977, Strayer hired Peggy Davies as a second pilot and then, in 1980, when Davies became a Pepsi corporate pilot, Strayer hired Suzanne Asbury. Pepsi also gave the aircraft a bright red, white, and blue paint scheme. Strayer died in 1981 and, in 1982, Steve Oliver joined Asbury as a second pilot for the Pepsi aircraft fleet that included N434P, another 1929 Travel Air. In 2000, Suzanne and Steve Oliver suggested that the aircraft should be retired for safety's sake, and Pepsi-Cola Company donated it to the National Air and Space Museum. The Pepsi Skywriter is currently displayed at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles Airport.
AIRS provides a daily global 3-dimensional view of Earth's ozone layer. Since AIRS observes in the thermal infrared spectral range, it also allows scientists to view from space the Antarctic ozone hole for the first time continuously during polar winter. This image sequence captures the intensification of the annual ozone hole in the Antarctic Polar Vortex.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Additional formats and frames ›
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
AIRS radiances and standard retrievals were used to obtain thin cirrus particle size and optical depth over the tropical oceans. (a) Normalized probability distribution of cloud top temperature for a total of 29 days. Histograms are partitioned into 5 bins of (0.0-0.1, 0.1-0.25, 0.25-0.5, 0.5-0.75, and 0.75-1.0). (B) Joint probability distributions of cloud top temperature and particle size for the same time period and intervals as (A). (C) Histograms of particle size for the same bins listed in (B). These results illustrate the usefulness of AIRS to characterize the cloudy atmosphere in the upper tropical troposphere. They also show that particle size tends to increase with optical depth and cloud top temperature, results that are consistent from other studies that use satellite, surface-based, or aircraft observational platforms.
Citation
Kahn, B. H., Chahine, M. T., Stephens, G. L., Mace, G. G., Marchand, R. T., Wang, Z., Barnet, C. D., Eldering, A., Holz, R. E., Kuehn, R. E., and Vane, D. G.: Cloud type comparisons of AIRS, CloudSat, and CALIPSO cloud height and amount, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 8, 1231-1248, 2008.
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About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site
How to get the AIRS data
The AIRS sounder reveals important new information to supplement the familiar overhead views of hurricanes that come from satellites. Here AIRS shows some of the internal temperature structure of Supertyphoon Pongsona just as it hit the island of Guam last December of 2002. Each of the colored surfaces represents a particular temperature, from red and warm near the surface to yellow and very cold near the top. Normally, these so-called isotherms would be much smoother and nearly horizontal. Here we see how the latent heat released in convective updrafts causes the isotherms to bulge upward. This bulging is even seen more than 50,000 feet above sea level. This relatively warm air cap above a hurricane has rarely been observed and can only be measured with an instrument like AIRS. As we zoom in on the lower 30,000 feet, the temperature structure becomes more striking. It is even possible to discern a dip in the center at the lowest level, where cooler and drier air descends and forms the often cloud free eye of a hurricane.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
Cabbie supports the ShowDown in Downtown presented by the Steve Nash Foundation
Sponsored by Coast Capital Savings and BC Hydro PowerSmart
photos by Ron Sombilon Gallery
Cabral "Cabbie" Richards showing his continued support for Showdown in Downtown.
Showdown in Downtown is a collaboration of sponsors, local non-profits, sports superstars who educate and empower new energy for community action, the Street Festival brings together private and public resources to show off all we can do together.
About Cabral "Cabbie" Richards
Cabbie on the Street has evolved from an energetic streeter segment to a showcase of professional athletes in funny situations discussing a wide range of topics. It is the freshest injection of humour into the world of sports.
Cabral "Cabbie" Richards hits the streets, arenas and stadiums across North America interviewing professional athletes and participating in random sports all over the globe. Cabbie on the Street has become The Score's most recognizable feature.
Stars such as Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, Will Ferrell, Derek Jeter, Sidney Crosby and Alexander Ovechkin have all appeared on Cabbie on the Street.
CABBIE UNLIMITED season four airs begins on September 1st, 2009 at 7PM ET.
Cabbie on the Street is hosted and produced by Cabral Richards. Producer Dave Krikst, "My Man D" is releasing his own iPhone app. It’ll just make the phone cooler. "My Man B" cameraman Bryan Roy doesn’t think the G.I. Joe movie will be as good as the comic books. Editor Lawrence Thomas, "LT", once hit a homerun into a parking lot smashing a car’s window. He got beat up. Editor Bryan Maxwell, "Weezie", is a deal closer. Bottomline.
More information at
.
This visualization shows variations in the three dimensional distribution of water vapor in the atmosphere during the summer and fall of 2005. Water vapor at higher altitudes appears brighter.
The visualization highlights an often overlooked but important player in the climate system: water vapor. Water vapor frequently condenses into familiar—and visible—clouds and rain. Water vapor is also the most significant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, about twice as important as the more familiar carbon dioxide.
This movie shows the variations in the height of a surface representing a constant value of water vapor during the summer and fall of 2005. This water vapor surface is highest in the tropics where vapor amounts are largest. The greatest heights (about 3.2 km or 2 miles) occur over south Asia where monsoon thunderstorms carry water vapor high into the atmosphere. Other thunderstorms over Africa and South America lift water vapor there. In some regions of the tropics—such as off the west coast of South America— the height of the surface is lower. This indicates drier air brought downward to the surface in these regions. The concentration over the northern hemisphere show tendrils of water vapor being pulled from tropical storms into higher latitudes. Some of this water vapor may condense as rain or snow, far from the warm tropics where it originated.
____________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
A series of fires across Greece in August of 2007 burned 469,000 acres and claimed the lives of 65 people. The fires, in which an estimated 4,000 people lost their homes, mostly occurred in the southern part of of the country.
In this visualization, the carbon monoxide signature from the fires in Greece is revealed in data retrieved by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) on NASA's Aqua spacecraft. Forest fires create large amounts of carbon monoxide. AIRS provides daily global maps of carbon monoxide from space, allowing scientists to follow the global transport of this gas day-to-day. This visualization shows the amount of Carbon monoxide that has risen 2 to 8 kilometers (6,500 ft to 26,200 ft altitude) from August 24-28, 2007. More carbon monoxide generally means more pollution, either natural from wildfires or from industrial and domestic sources.
Beginning August 24, a significant plume emanates from the extensive fires burning in Greece. This plume moves southeast across the Mediterranean Sea and over North Africa from August 24 to 28. It crosses to Africa and arcs westward over the Sahara Desert and continues to curl around over the Eastern Mediterranean toward Sardinia and Corsica.
More information about AIRS can be found at airs.jpl.nasa.gov.
Additional formats and stills ›
Credit:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
This visualization shows 3D volumetric water vapor data from the Aqua/Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument. As the camera moves down and around the data set, the low data values are faded out revealing only the highest concentrations of water vapor data.
The color and opacity at each 3D voxel are driven by the water vapor data. The data set was obtained by Aqua on January 1, 2003. Only data from the sea level to about 10 km altitude are shown.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Additional formats and stills ›
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
Meir 20/04/2017 14h42
Kiss My Airs...
AntwerpenPeople (a group for candid people on the streets of Antwerpen...founded by me on 21/08/2011)
Packing gusts of nearly 300 kilometers per hour (184 miles per hour) and sustained winds of 240 kilometers per hour (150 miles per hour), Super-Typhoon Pongsona struck the U.S. Island of Guam on December 8, 2002. This 3D model of the hurricane shows the outline of the clouds, based on cloud top heights derived from observations from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua Satellite.
The color overlay represents the brightness temperatures observed in one of the Humidity Sounder for Brazil (HSB) channels. HSB also flies aboard NASA's Aqua Satellite.
Blue areas indicate intense convection and rain, while green and yellow reflect the internal temperature of the clouds. Microwaves, unlike infrared radiation, penetrate clouds and look into them or even through them. Red, most of which has been removed from the picture for clarity, represents areas where HSB penetrates all the way to the surface.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Additional formats and stills ›
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
These images show the joint distributions of cloud top temperature, particle size, and optical depth with relative humidity with respect to ice (RHic), all of which are calculated from AIRS. (A) Normalized frequency distributions of RHic binned into intervals of 10%. (B) Percentage of cases with specific humidity between 15-30 ppmv; instances with specific humidity <15 ppmv not included because of the insensitivity and unreliability of specific humidity in dry conditions. (C) RHic vs. cloud top temperature (K). (D) RHic vs. particle size (microns). These figures show that RHic tends to increase with decreasing cloud top temperature, increasing optical depth, and decreasing particle size. Even though the thin cirrus clouds are usually geometrically thinner than the vertical resolution of AIRS temperature and specific humidity, these results are consistent with those from some in situ campaigns and demonstrate the utility of AIRS to characterize joint distributions of humidity and cloud properties.
Citation
Kahn, B. H., Liang, C. K., Eldering, A., Gettelman, A., Yue, Q., and Liou, K. N.: Tropical thin cirrus and
relative humidity observed by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 8, 1501-1518, 2008.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site
How to get the AIRS data
Light Airs Jewellery
Designer: Phil Hodgson
Model: Jessica Sauders
Make up: Holly Moore
Photography: Kate Pook
One Large Softbox to the front, one honey comb camera right up and above infront. one honeycomb slightly below and behind camera left.
The plume of carbon monoxide pollution from the Rim Fire burning in and near Yosemite National Park, Calif., is visible in this Aug. 26, 2013 image from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua spacecraft. The image shows a three-day running average of daily measurements of carbon monoxide present at an altitude of 18,000 feet (5.5 kilometers), as well as its global transport. The abundance of carbon monoxide is shown in parts per billion, with the highest concentrations shown in yellows and reds. The carbon monoxide plume from the Rim fire now extends into Canada. Even more prominent in the image are the carbon monoxide emissions from widespread agricultural fires in Africa and South America, and fires in the northern forests of Asia.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
More information about AIRS can be found at airs.jpl.nasa.gov.
Image Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
How to get AIRS data
This movie of temperature observations from NASA's Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua spacecraft depicts the first major North American weather event of 2014: cold air moving out of the Arctic and south to cover much of the continent. The temperatures shown are at a pressure of 850 hectopascals (hPa, formerly knows as millibars; sea level pressure is normally around 1000 hPa). Pressures of 850 hPa correspond to an altitude of about 3,000 feet (1 kilometer) above sea level. The temperatures in the movie range from about minus 18 degrees Fahrenheit (245 Kelvin or minus 28 degrees Celsius) to warmer than 66 degrees Fahrenheit (290 Kelvin or about 17 degrees Celsius). The very coldest temperatures in purples and blues are minus 18 to 17 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 28 to about minus 8 degrees Celsius).
The most obvious feature of the movie is the tongue of cold air moving out of Canada and southward to cover much of the eastern United States during early January 2014. This event was covered extensively in the media, and introduced the term 'polar vortex' to a broader audience.
This global perspective illustrates some features not noted in all the recent media attention. Perhaps most obvious: this is not a global phenomenon. The eastern half of the United States includes only about one percent of the total surface area of the planet (about two million of 197 million square miles). One advantage of satellite observations, as from AIRS, is coverage of the entire planet. A truly global perspective is required when studying variations in climate, and this event must be compared against a number of other phenomena occurring around the planet. Note that Alaska and northern Eurasia were warm during this period of unusual cold over the eastern United States.
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About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, three-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
More information about AIRS can be found at airs.jpl.nasa.gov.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL
These false-color images show the amount of atmospheric water vapor observed by AIRS two weeks prior to the passage of Hurricane Isabel, and then when it was a Category 5 storm. The region shown includes parts of South America and the West Indies. Puerto Rico is the large island below the upper left corner.
Total water vapor represents the depth of a layer if all the water vapor in the atmosphere were to condense and fall to the surface. The color bar on the right sides of the plots give the thickness of this layer in millimeters (mm). The first image, from August 28, shows typical tropical water vapor amounts over the ocean: between roughly 25 and 50 mm, or 1 to 2 inches. The highest values of roughly 80 mm, seen as a red blob over South America, corresponds to intense thunderstorms. Thunderstorms pull in water vapor from surrounding regions and concentrate it, with much of it then falling as rain.
Figure 1 (found on the JPL Photojournal linked to below) shows total water during the passage of Hurricane Isabel on September 13. The storm is apparent: the ring of moderate values surrounding a very strong maximum of 100 mm. Total water of more than 80 mm is unusual, and these values correspond to the intense thunderstorms contained within Isabel. The thunderstorms--and the large values of total water--are fed by evaporation from the ocean in the hurricane's high winds. The water vapor near the center of the storm does not remain there long, since hurricane rain rates as high 50 mm (2 inches) per hour imply rapid cycling of the water we observe. Away from the storm the amount of total water vapor is rather low, associated with fair weather where air that ascended near the storm's eye returns to earth, having dropped its moisture as rain. Also seen in the second images are two small regions of about 70 mm of total water over south America. These are yet more thunderstorms, though likely much more benign than those in Isabel.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
A companion image can be found on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory Photojournal ›
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
"Molten Airs" is the title of the Ars Electronica Garden in Vilnius hosted by Institutio Media (LT), Alt lab in collaboration with Lithuanian Interdisciplinary Artists' Association (LT).
After our birth, bit by bit we get to know our mother, our father and our surrounding environment. We learn what we can put in our mouths and what is understood to be inedible. We also get to know about other species that live in our surroundings. As we begin to go to school, we are trained to know that experiences are fictions, that organisms are composed of many cells, and that the molecules of said cells interact with molecules outside of them.
The *Molten Airs* workshop series builds its narratives on casual life processes, repetitive habits, and social practices. By speculating on the human relationship to plants, food, or energy, but also using methods borrowed from the sciences, the series delves into unknown interactions between small and large, real and fictional, alive and not alive, us and them.
The workshop series contains three episodes, each created by a different artist. In *You and I, You and Me* episode, Mindaugas Gapševičius questions the impact of electricity on life processes and, while using it, builds links between us and them. Brigita Kasperaitė in her *Plant Trafficking* re-thinks the monetary and spiritual values of nature in our daily lives. And Kamilė Krasauskaitė in her *Sourdough DNA* develops the narrative of collaboration between humans and microorganisms and how it all shapes the food we eat.
The audience is invited to contribute to the workshops with their stories, images and sounds.
Photo: Kamilė Krasauskaitė
She wanted to have airs, and the other; she just could never afford them. There were no plastic coverings necessary to hold back the dirt from her sofas, there were no sofas, no Sunday parlour closed off from the children for guests. There was just that one chipped tiled fireplace in the small living-room, and what would have been the parlour was the shop, that beloved ‘Bon-Bon’. So, one desperate mother, one ‘absinthe father’, and five gawping offspring grew up in one tiny living-room, and smaller kitchen.
Then there was that time she had us go out at night, out to that small patch of land, postage-stamp size (luckily), with blunt scissors, and attempt to cut the damp grass, to placate the rent-charging neighbour, Biddy Heffernan, to proffer some evidence of upkeep of the property. Or that other time she had us dye the carpet with bottles of black ink, to hide the stains. Unfortunately, it wasn’t waterproof ink, so trouble ensued, as would be expected, or at least as much as any sane person might expect it to. Even we, the children, understood these domestic administrations to be verging on the unstable. They were somewhat painful to witness, and the coercion needed to get us to collaborate, and execute these masterstrokes, was somewhat damaging to our brutalized sense of childish selves. The desperation was registered, inverted, and absorbed, and left to burgeon into lifelong ‘drivers’ in each of us, taking a different form according to the coping strategies of each child. Even now, as somewhat wizened ‘adults’, the children would sometimes get together and laugh about these mad escapades. There is a sort of tacit agreement that nobody talks of the damage this might have done, these eccentric tasks, but we secretly see it in each other as we laugh uproariously. We even sort of understand each other’s mistakes somewhat, but are also mostly glad when the evening is over so we can forget it all again, and retreat, until the next time. Some of us even fly away to foreign shores to escape these encounters in the hope of avoiding these reveries indefinitely.
Some never fly back.
This is where that story comes from, told by the youngest, of being able to change his own nappy/diaper by the time he was six months old. As Monty Python would have it, “He was lucky, he had a nappy”, or a shoebox, or whatever.
Poverty porn is just that, poverty porn, and we won’t be having room for that, at all (at all). It’s good to be at that point of realisation that every family has its own madness, and universal madness issues from that omnipresent and generous font, that overflowing cornucopia.
The poverty doesn’t really interest him, but that font does, that overflowing. This was not going to be a rags-to-riches redemption story. He was more or less sure that we are the only species that rabbits on mindlessly about ‘universal forgiveness’; this deserved looking at, and vanquishing even. It seemed to him that ‘universal embracing’ made much more sense, that ‘impossible dream’, as mister Brel and his cohorts would warble on about.
Rack had no siblings. She was an only ‘Protestant’ child. Ruin had two brothers, and two sisters, a ‘Catholic’ brood.
Rack envied Ruin, and Ruin envied Rack. Let’s start there.
Whispering Grass, the trees don't have to know.
"Don't you tell it to the breeze 'cause she will tell the birds and bees
And ev'ryone will know because you told the blabbering trees."
Whispering Grass
Song by Doris Fisher / Fred Fisher
"And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out."
Luke 19:40
A friend, Thalia, sent me a photo of some, fully mature, botanists at play. I understand these wonderful adventurers completely. I don't own this photograph. I love that someone is doing this, so I don't have to. Time is short, as they say. I guffaw. I cannot help but wonder what 'Aliens' might make of this, or any of our obsessions for that matter. I wonder would they, the Aliens, be able to distinguish us from all the other sacred cows.
And then there's the idea of dust, both breathing and breeding, making Duchamp (and by extension Man Ray), a part of this unholy trinity of expanding ideas.
Rack: I love the stories of your childhood household. It’s amazing how funny you make destitution. Poverty porn, as you say. When I read it, I want you to take me further indoors to that world. I want to see it all.
Published on Feb 28, 2014
Wet weather is again hitting drought-stricken California as the second and larger of two back-to-back storms makes its way ashore. The storms are part of an atmospheric river, a narrow channel of concentrated moisture in the atmosphere connecting tropical air with colder, drier regions around Earth's middle latitudes. The storm that arrived on Feb. 26, 2014, and the one about to hit, are contained within the "Pineapple Express," an atmospheric river that extends from the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii to the Pacific coast of North America, where it often brings heavy precipitation. This next storm is expect to be the largest rain producer in Southern California in three years.
This animation, created with data acquired by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite, shows the total amount of water vapor contained in the atmosphere for most of the month of February if it were all to fall as rain. Typically, the atmosphere over Southern California and most of the continental U.S. in winter holds only about 0.4 inch (10 millimeters) or less of water vapor. However, much wetter air lies tantalizingly close in regions to the south and west. The largest amounts of atmospheric moisture, up to 2.4 inches (60 millimeters), are associated with a persistent band of thunderstorms circling the tropics. These thunderstorms are the source of several atmospheric rivers apparent in this animation. One atmospheric river arises near Hawaii around Feb. 10 and comes ashore in Central California a few days later, bringing the largest Sierra Nevada snowfall of the season to date. Other atmospheric rivers can be see originating in the Gulf of Mexico and extending into the Atlantic on the right side of the movie; the northward movement of tropical water vapor is important in winter storms in the eastern U.S. and Europe. The animation concludes with the current Pineapple Express. Moisture from around Hawaii has surged northeast, and the persistent, dry air immediately west of Baja California has been replace by air with up to 1.6 inches (40 millimeters) of water vapor. The next storm will bring that moisture ashore, where it will be forced upward by coastal mountains to fall as heavy rain. Up to 8 inches (20.3 centimeters) of rain is predicted in some parts of the Los Angeles area by March 2, bringing possible flooding and landslides to recent wildfire burn areas.
The recent cold conditions in the eastern U.S. are also apparent in this movie as very dry regions. Because cold air can hold relatively little water (less than 0.4 inch or 10 millimeters), cold region are always dry. So, the eastern U.S. has some of the driest air in this animation. However, high pressure systems also dry the atmosphere by forcing down air from above.
That descending air expands and warms, but retains the low moisture amounts it had when it was higher and cold. So, cold Minnesota and warm Mexico have similar water vapor amounts in this movie.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download
Download this video from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory web site
AIRS web site
How to get AIRS data
In this animation, the field of view of the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft is represented by the blue beam as it sweeps back and forth through the atmosphere down to the surface of the Earth. AIRS collects infrared radiance data in this field of view. Panning down, a rainbow-colored column representing temperature layers in the atmosphere is revealed. Temperature values are one of the measurements that will be produced from the infrared radiances. The white vertical beam that runs horizontally across the column represents one scan of the AIRS instrument across the column. The red footprints below the column are meant to suggest the 30 individual vertical columns (profiles) that are captured in one scan. One profile is pulled out of the column and mapped on to a temperature scale to reinforce the idea that each profile contains data up through a vertical column in the atmosphere.
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About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
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Resources
Additional formats and frames ›
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site ›
How to get the AIRS data
These sub-panels show differences in the characteristics of RHic histograms within thin cirrus clouds for different regions and time periods. (A) Normalized RHic distributions over the N. Indian Ocean and partitioned by year (2002-2006). (B) same as (A) except for the S. Indian Ocean. (C) Normalized RHic distributions for the tropical ocean average (±20 latitude) and for four sub-regions: the NH, SH, and N. and S. Indian Oceans. These histograms show that the variability from year to year is somewhat higher in the N. Indian Ocean versus the S. Indian Ocean, even though the total counts in the histograms are very similar. Furthermore, they also show that the North Indian Ocean tends to have 5-10% higher RHic compared to other regions. Whether this is caused by anthropogenic activity (e.g., aerosols) or controlled by the dynamics of the South Asian monsoon, or another cause is yet to be determined.
Citation
Kahn, B. H., Liang, C. K., Eldering, A., Gettelman, A., Yue, Q., and Liou, K. N.: Tropical thin cirrus and
relative humidity observed by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 8, 1501-1518, 2008.
______________________________________________________________________
About AIRS
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder, AIRS, in conjunction with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU, sense emitted infrared and microwave radiation from the Earth to provide a three-dimensional look at Earth's weather and climate. Working in tandem, the two instruments make simultaneous observations all the way down to the Earth's surface, even in the presence of heavy clouds. With more than 2,000 channels sensing different regions of the atmosphere, the system creates a global, 3-dimensional map of atmospheric temperature and humidity, cloud amounts and heights, greenhouse gas concentrations, and many other atmospheric phenomena. The AIRS and AMSU fly onboard NASA's Aqua spacecraft and are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, under contract to NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Credit
NASA/JPL AIRS Project
Download the image
Various sizes of the image are available, and there are two ways to download:
1) Right-click on the image. Click on a size next to "View all sizes".
2) Click on the "Actions" menu located above the image. Select "View all sizes".
Resources
Atmospheric Infrared Sounder web site
How to get the AIRS data