Nighttime polar orbiter satellite photos of Jamaica before and after #Melissa show how the power grid was affected. Melissa knocked out power to about 77% of Jamaica’s customers, said Minister of Local Government Desmond McKenzie. Photos from worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov

“Once we arrived in central Jamaica we started to see how severely the island has been hit. The town of Mandeville has been, for want of a better word, flattened. A petrol station had lost its roof and most of its pumps.” www.bbc.com/news/article...

The satellite derived wind field really puts the scale into prospective. Around half the Jamaica will see hurricane force winds from Melissa, but several parishes (Westmoreland, Saint Elizabeth, Manchester, Saint James, Trelawny) will see extreme winds over 95kts/110 mph. Higher in the mountains.

#Melissa unfortunately is still intensifying. A 9am EDT Tropical Cyclone Update indicates that winds are up to 180 mph, with an estimated minimum pressure of 896 mb. You can see how GLM lightning has 📈 in the past hour, encircling the eye, with eye WV temp still increasing!

Waiting on a dropsonde to confirm, but Melissa is most certainly below 900 hPa right now. Tragically we are about to witness the 2nd or 1st deepest Atlantic hurricane landfall by min MSLP on record in Jamaica.

The western end of Jamaica where #Melissa is projected to make landfall has the least well-built structures of anyplace on the island. Graphic is from a 2021 paper, "Poverty and hurricane risk exposure in Jamaica": www.researchgate.net/publication/...

What we're witnessing with #Melissa is ultra rare in the history of known hurricanes in the Atlantic. This level of sustained intensity and feasting on every joule of ocean heat content without any real disruption is incredible. Not hyperbole: Jamaica is facing a generational catastrophic event.

The monster eye at the center of a still strengthening Hurricane Melissa.

Sunrise on Hurricane Melissa. Melissa is now a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 140 mph.

Melissa has rapidly intensified into a category 4 major hurricane according to preliminary NHC estimates: - from 60 to 120 kt in 24 hours (⬆️ 60 kt) - from 90 to 110 kt in just 6 hours (⬆️ 20 kt) This slow-moving storm will not only deliver damaging winds & storm surge but also catastrophic rainfall.

Category 4 🚨 Major Hurricane Melissa 5:00 AM EDT Sun Oct 26 Location: 16.3°N 76.3°W Moving: W at 5 mph Min pressure: 944 mb Max sustained: 140 mph (image via @tropicaltidbits.bsky.social)

Recon is finding #Melissa notably stronger, at about 85kt with pressure having dropped all the way to 971mb. The wind field is much more coherent and symmetric, and there are double hot towers trying to surround the eye. Could see some impressive intensification rates from recon this evening

Jamaica, in particular, will likely suffer catastrophic impacts from now rapidly-intensifying (but slow-moving) Hurricane #Melissa. A *Category 5* landfall now appears to be the most likely outcome, & 30-40+ inches of *additional* rain in mountains will lead to extreme flooding.

And here we go again with Hurricane #Melissa. RI ongoing and expected to continue.

With the GFS coming more in-line with the rest of the model guidence this afternoon, it confirms that Tropical Storm Melissa will produce near-historic amounts of rainfall and flooding for Jamaica, Hispanola, and eastern Cuba when it makes landfall as a major hurricane.

#Melissa is about to undergo rapid intensification (RI). And I anticipate it will be quite explosive. A classic cyan ring on 37 GHz imagery from this GMI overpass at 1447 UTC.

The current forecast at Cape May Harbor Sunday afternoon has major flooding. Uh oh.

This will be a common sight across #SaintAugustine into the weekend. Continuous periods of heavy rainfall combined with a developing Nor’easter off the coast will contribute to flooding across the area. Never drive through flooded roadways. Good news: much drier next week. #wx

A textbook example of concentric eyewalls in Super Typhoon #Ragasa as seen from Chinese radars. This and other radar loops are available at bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/radar/. #HuajiashaCN

There are a lot of NWS positions now posted on USAJobs. Come work with us! I guarantee you'll have a tough time finding public servants more passionate about the work they do. www.usajobs.gov/search/resul...

Half-baked notion, so caveats. But if LLMs are basically trained on our collective work without permission or consent and then used to routinize much of that work, a large share of the capital gains should go to a national fund dividend, analogous to the Alaska Fund, that pays us all.

⛈️⛈️⛈️

Twenty years ago today, Hurricane Katrina (2005) made landfall in Louisiana. Four years ago today, Hurricane Ida (2021) made landfall in Louisiana. This animation shows Katrina on the left and Ida on the right over the same 24-hour period using NOAA Merged IR (left) and NOAA ABI Band 13 (right).

Neat Mercury / Venus action going on this morning.

What a beautiful site: www.usajobs.gov/search/resul... The first of the entry level meteorologist positions have posted and are open until Sept 8th. The Weather Service is a fantastic agency and I am happy to see us hiring again.

We're basically on pace for number of Atlantic tropical storms over the past 30 years.

Erin with a well defined eye just northeast of Puerto Rico as a major hurricane.

Tropical Storm #Erin is still chugging westward & remains small, but convection (thunderstorms) is getting stronger near its center shown by colder cloud tops. Overnight, it can be easier for a storm's convection to take off. NOAA GOES-19 1-minute meso sector infrared imagery from the past 6 hours:

Officials in Juneau area now saying a glacial outburst flood release has begun from Suicide Basin into the Mendenhall River. NWS is now forecasting a crest of 16.6' on the river, higher than last year's record flood in Juneau.

The economy is so good that I'm firing the BLS Commissioner for reporting numbers so grim I refuse to believe them, and also demanding the Fed cut rates typically seen during a recession.

We have a reliable #tsunami warning system due to #NOAA funding and research at the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory. 🧪🌊🛟 doi.org/10.5670/ocea...

What is a derecho? Short answer: t.co/ET8SBa1yT4 Long answer: SPC: <2020: 58 mph wind gusts 240x50 mi 2020: 250x50 mi 2022: 400x60 mi cont. or int. 2025: 250x60 mi *AND* these 9 meteorological criteria:

When you strip away humanity

The elevated precipitable water over Florida this week will certainly increase the flash flood threat. Though tropical development may still be lacking until after the disturbance crosses over the state, it's going to be the area to watch over the next few days.

Looks like I found my answer and a whole article explanation to boot!

Hey @michaelrlowry.bsky.social I remember last year you made this great AOD graphic. What does it look like this year so far?

We're going to continue to struggle with messaging unless organizations have multiple ways of receiving and acting on rapid warnings issued in the middle of the night. My vote is for more weather aware Safety Officers and designees. I'd love to hear other thoughts. The loss of life is a tragedy.

The Texas floods over the last 2 days were predominantly associated with a long-lasting mesoscale convective vortex (MCV), but notice how there are multiple discrete rainfall maxima shown in the contours, each associated with different rainfall rates, duration, and phenomenon:

As the death toll climbs in the wake of the Texas floods, lots of finger-pointing re: the NWS' forecasts and warnings. The bottom line: An agency reeling from cuts still issued timely outlooks & warnings. Lots of ?s though (1/2) www.cnn.com/2025/07/05/c...

And as of 8am EDT, we now have our 3️⃣rd named storm of the 2025 Hurricane Season, #Chantal. Air Force Reserve Recon scheduled to investigate the system later this morning.

Breaking #TropicalStormChantal www.forbes.com/sites/marsha...

Flood Watch issued yesterday at 1:18 pm. WPC had mesoscale discussions throughout the event. NWS issues Flash Flood Warning at 1:14 am. NWS issues Flash Flood Emergency at 4:03 am. NWS was on the ball. The challenge is always getting the warning the last mile and getting people to respond.

This hydrograph of the Guadalupe River in Comfort is terrifying with this…something like 25 feet in 45 minutes.

A comprehensive article of what is at stake with the current budget proposed by the DoC ➡️ NOAA. Nearly every aspect of what we do at NHC has been touched by NOAA Research in one facet or another to our benefit. #AOML, #CIMSS, #CIRA, #CIMAS all play key roles & losing any of them would be horrific.

With the Heat Wave expected across the Central and Eastern US this weekend into early next week, this was an excellent video primer on the Limit of Compensability for adults and associated Heat Risk. Great Job by @ccivanovich.bsky.social and the PBS Terra team youtu.be/7hBMbQ9de1g?...

First significant heat wave likely for the Northeast US. 00z 6/16 NAEFS guidance showing forecast 500mb heights easily reaching dataset maximum (CFSR climo) over a large area of the eastern US early next week.

This is one the most authentic, frustrating, and alarming inside looks at what pressure, cuts and "forced" retirement have done to a critical National Weather Service forecast office. Worth a read to illustrate what many of us have been saying www.nbcnews.com/science/scie...

June 6th, 1944: The D-Day invasion commenced in northern France. The operation had been scheduled for the previous day (June 5), though after some debate, meteorologists working with Allied command correctly determined that weather conditions would be too rough.

Another active evening. Tornado south of McAlester, Oklahoma from the TDS. Long night ahead.

As a severe weather outbreak became increasingly likely Friday, meteorologists at the National Weather Service office in Jackson, Kentucky, made the decision to call everyone in and staff the overnight shift, according to Tom Fahy, who represents the NWS Employees Union.