Northeast USA, 2-13-2017 (credit: GOES-16 satellite, NOAA)

NOAA's new GOES-16 environmental satellite has begun returning real-time monitoring of storm systems as they form. The first data results are super-important and impressive.

According to NOAA:

the imagery from GOES-16 shows the intensification of a winter storm that brought heavy snow to Maine and other areas of the Northeast on, February 13, 2017. As the storm moved off the coast over the Atlantic, its surface pressure dropped steeply in just 18 hours. This rapid drop in pressure is refered to as a "bomb," a term for the rapid intensification of a low pressure system (aka: cyclone). If the surface pressure falls at least 24 millibars in a 24 hour period it is called: bombogenesis. 

Besides the critical value of real-time environmental data from NOAA's new satellite to climate monitoring and weather forecasts, the visualizations are exceptionally beautiful to watch.

WHB