Image:Hurricane Isaac 01 oct 2006 1435Z.jpg

Hurricane Isaac became the fifth hurricane of the 2006 Atlantic Hurricane season on September 30. Beginning as a tropical depression three days earlier, Isaac formed in the central Atlantic Ocean far from any land. Isaac initially headed northeast on a track towards Bermuda, picking up power to become a hurricane. But Hurricane Isaac never posed a threat to the island, as it was veering off onto a more northerly track even as the storm became more organized and powerful. As of October 2, 2006, Isaac was heading north and slightly east in the general direction of the Canadian Maritime Provinces, but it was expected to curve off east and not come ashore in Canada either. The hurricane was losing power as it travelled north and was downgraded to a tropical storm by midday on October 2.

This photo-like image was acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite on October 1 2006, at 12:35 p.m. local time (14:35 UTC). Isaac is a small well-formed tight ball of spiralling clouds around a well-defined eye filled with clouds (a “closed” eye). According to the University of Hawaii’s Tropical Storm Information Center, Isaac had sustained winds reaching as high as 75 miles per hour (85 mph according to NHC).

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/natural_hazards_v2.php3?img_id=13904

2006-10-01

NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of the MODIS Rapid Response team.