Today's Image of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> features Hurricane Ian, which has tied the record for the strongest hurricane to make landfall on the west coast of the Florida peninsula. The storm made landfall on Wednesday near Cayo Costa with winds speeds of up to 155 miles per hour.



Even after Ian was downgraded to a tropical storm on Thursday, it was still dumping heavy rainfall across Florida. The threat of catastrophic flooding and dangerous storm surges will continue as Ian moves across the state and north toward South Carolina and Georgia.&nbsp;



More than 2.6 million people are without power today. Rescue efforts are underway in Fort Meyers, where the Florida National Guard is pulling people off roofs. Search and rescue teams are also active in many other areas along the western coast, including Tampa.&nbsp;



"Hurricane Ian grew substantially as it charged across the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico in late September 2022. After damaging parts of Cuba and leaving much of the country in the dark, forecasters expected more destruction as the storm reached Florida’s west coast on the afternoon of September 28," says NASA.



"In Cuba, about 11 million people were left without power, according to news reports. Winds and floodwaters destroyed buildings, farms, and left many roads impassable. As the storm approached Florida, the U.S. hurricane center warned of potentially catastrophic storm surges and wind damage along the southwest coastline and life-threatening flooding across some central parts of the state."



Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Hurricane Ian unleashed catastrophic conditions in Florida

Today's Image of the Day from NASA Earth Observatory features...

Today's Image of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> features a map of sea surface temperatures (SSTs) on September 26 as Hurricane Ian moved through the Gulf of Mexico. The sea surface temperatures were measured by NASA scientists using a combination of satellite and ocean instruments.



"Though tropical cyclones are atmospheric phenomena, much of their fearsome power comes from the ocean. The seas are abundant sources of moisture to feed growing storm clouds. Just as critically, they are vast repositories of thermal energy that can move from the sea to the sky," says NASA.



"As Hurricane Ian lashed western Cuba and headed for the west coast of Florida on September 27, 2022, it moved over an abundant fuel source in the Gulf of Mexico. While sea surface temperatures are just one of the factors influencing hurricanes, they are a fair predictor of the readiness of the ocean to sustain them."



"Meteorologists generally agree that SSTs should be above 27.8° Celsius (82.04° Fahrenheit) to sustain and intensify hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons. Surface waters above that threshold are represented in red on the map."



Ian is expected to make landfall in western Florida today as a Category 4 storm with winds of up to 155 mph. As of 10 a.m., the center of Ian was located about 60 miles west of Naples and 65 miles southwest of Punta Gorda and 180 miles south-southwest of Orlando, according to the National Hurricane Center.



Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Hurricane Ian will hit the western coast of Florida today

Today's Image of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> features Super Typhoon Noru, which made landfall in the Philippines on September 25 after reaching category 4 strength in less than 24 hours. Noru first hit the Polillo Islands before making a second landfall on the island of Luzon. At least six people were killed, and tens of thousands have evacuated their homes.



"The technical definition of 'rapid intensification' of a tropical cyclone is a storm with winds that increase by at least 55 kilometers (35 miles) per hour in a 24-hour period. In the Western Pacific, Super Typhoon Noru blew past that threshold," says NASA.



"The storm’s winds accelerated from 80 kilometers (50 miles) per hour on September 24 to 250 kilometers (155 miles) per hour the next day. Meteorologists have only recorded a handful of storms that have ever intensified so much so quickly."



"The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on Suomi NPP acquired this image of Noru on September 25, 2022, a few hours after landfall. Clouds are shown in infrared brightness temperature data, which is useful for distinguishing cooler cloud structures (purple) from warmer surfaces below (yellow). The coolest temperatures (white) are generally associated with the tallest clouds."



Noru is expected to make landfall in central Vietnam, where authorities are urging 400,000 people to evacuate before the storm arrives.



Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Super Typhoon Noru intensified at a shocking pace

Today's Image of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> features the Brahmaputra, also known as the Yarlung Tsangpo, in northern India. The photo was captured by an astronaut onboard the International Space Station.



"The mighty river appears as two major channels; several small islands sit within them and a large island separates them. Together they form a Brahmaputra floodplain that measures fully 10 kilometers (6 miles) in width. The channels appear brighter than those of the other rivers in this photo because they are near the Sun’s glint point," reports NASA.



The Dibang and Lohit Rivers flow nearby and join the Brahmaputra, which merges with the Ganges River in Bangladesh and ultimately dumps into the Bay of Bengal.&nbsp;



"South Asia’s monsoon rainfall regime brings heavy rain to this part of India from March through June, feeding the river and floodplain. Tropical forest is the natural vegetation of this landscape," says NASA.



"Human-built features seem minuscule here compared to the river channels. Most of the area includes land under cultivation, which appears as numerous small and irregular plots. Farms along the riverbanks are especially prone to damage and destruction by floods and by the persistent erosion of the banks."



On the other hand, there are no agricultural plots in the Brahmaputra floodplain, as this is a protected natural area within the Daying Ering Memorial Wildlife Sanctuary.



Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

The Brahmaputra river in northern India

Today's Image of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> features Bahrain, an archipelago on the southwestern coast of the Persian Gulf. The small island country, which is officially called the Kingdom of Bahrain, has grown rapidly in recent years.&nbsp;



"As developers reclaimed land from the sea, the shape of the island nation’s coastline has changed. So, too, has the underwater habitat around it," says NASA.



Norman Kuring is a retired researcher from NASA’s ocean biology group, who processed the image using color-filtering techniques to draw out details in the water. “I wasn’t looking for Persian Gulf imagery specifically in this case,” said Kuring. “The region just looked clear that day, and the shallow bottom offered interesting possibilities.”



Near the shores of Bahrain, the Gulf is just a few meters deep in some places, and sunlight reflects off of surfaces beneath the water.



Eman Ghoneim, a physical geographer at UNC Wilmington, thinks the dark shapes along the seafloor toward the bottom-left of the image are old sand dunes. "Thousands of years ago, when sea levels were lower, the dunes were sculpted by wind into crescent shapes. Then rising seas submerged them," explains NASA.



"Perhaps most obvious submerged features in the images are the large reefs surrounding Bahrain, visible as the light-green areas offshore." "Historically, these structures known as 'fasht' were coral or pearl oyster reefs. Today, most of them are dead coral skeletons, although some rocky surfaces still have living corals attached to them, according to Ghoneim, who has studied this underwater habitat with satellites and field surveys."



The image was captured on July 24, 2022 by the Operational Land Imager-2 (OLI-2) on Landsat 9.



Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

The fascinating underwater landscape of Bahrain

Young,Lady,Running,On,A,Rural,Road,During,Sunset

It has long been established that men outpace women in mid- and long-distance running. However, speed over shorter distances is determined by the magnitude of force <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/covid-19-increases-heart-inflammation-risk-in-young-athletes/">athletes</a> can apply in relation to body mass. Muscular force to body mass ratio is greater in smaller individuals, and women tend to be smaller than men.&nbsp;



The understanding of sex performance differences for short sprint events has received little attention. The understanding of comparative strength, speed and endurance capabilities of male and female athletes has been a challenging issue for modern sport.&nbsp;



In a new study, PhD candidate Emily McClelland and Peter Weyand, director of the <a href="https://www.smu.edu/">Southern Methodist University</a> Locomotor Performance Lab set out to investigate. The team used data from international competitions such as the Olympics and World Championships, between 2003 and 2018. McClelland hypothesized that sex differences in sprint running performance might be relatively small and increase with distance.



The data revealed that the difference between male and female performance time increased with event distance from 8.6 to 11 percent from shortest to longest sprint events (60 to 400<s> </s>meters). The analysis of each 10-meter segment of the 100-meter event revealed a pattern across distance - sex differences increased from a low of 5.6 percent for the first segment to a high of 14.2 percent in the last segment.



This would suggest that women are at an advantage for shorter sprint distances compared to men. In contrast to other running species like horses and dogs, there is significant variation in size between human males and females. Body size differences result in muscular force to body mass ratios that are greater in smaller individuals.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Since sprinting velocities are dependent on the mass-specific forces runners can apply, greater force/mass ratios of smaller individuals provide a theoretical advantage. During the acceleration phase of a race, the shorter legs of a female lead to more steps and pushing cycles per unit time. These factors offset the advantages of males (longer legs and greater muscularity) that become more influential over longer distances.



Shelly-Ann Fraser Pryce is a Jamaican track and field star who is 5’0” tall, 115 pounds, and holds two Olympic and five World Championship gold medals in the 100-meter event. Her time at the 40-yard mark of a 100-meter race has been estimated to be as fast as 4.51 seconds. This was faster than half of all the wide receivers and running backs that tested in the National Football League’s Scouting Combine in 2022. Most of these aspiring NFL football players are over 6’ tall and 200 pounds.



The research is <a href="https://journals.physiology.org/doi/abs/10.1152/japplphysiol.00359.2022">published</a> in the Journal of Applied Physiology.



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.



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By <a href="mailto:katherinebucko@gmail.com">Katherine Bucko</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Women have an advantage when running short distances

It has long been established that men outpace women in...

Honey,Bee,Pollinating,Sunflower,Plant

In recent decades, ozone levels in the lower troposphere have increased. Ozone (O3) is a secondary <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/plastic-pollution-is-making-the-ocean-more-acidic/">pollutant</a> formed during the reaction of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) with nitrogen oxides (NOx) in the presence of sunlight. It damages the leaves of plants and inhibits photosynthesis, accelerates and extends flowering season, and alters the number of flowers open at any one time. In addition, ozone changes the chemical structure of pollen, inhibits pollen tube growth and alters the amount of pollen and nectar formed, as well as their chemical composition. 



A new study by scientists from China and Spain has now proposed that ozone may also be affecting the health of insect pollinators in ways that impair their ability to pollinate flowers successfully. The study takes the form of a literature review that highlights the ways in which ozone impacts insect pollinators.



“There is much noise about the direct effects of agrochemicals on pollinators, a subject of profound societal attention, but it now emerges that ozone is a silent threat to pollinators and thus pollination,” said lead author Evgenios Agathokleous, an ecologist at Nanjing University of Information Science &amp; Technology. “These impacts of ozone have long been missed.”



Ozone changes the chemical composition of leaves and the amount and blend of plant-emitted VOCs. This means that leaves and flowers may develop unusual colors which can confuse pollinators searching for suitable blooms. In addition, the VOCs provide important chemical signals that attract pollinators and, if these change in composition, the plant-insect interactions may be altered as a result. Ozone also produces new volatiles that may be unfamiliar to the pollinating insects looking for cues about which flowers to visit.&nbsp;



This colorless gas is an important ally when it occurs in the stratosphere, 12 km above sea level. Here it forms naturally and helps protect the Earth from the Sun’s harmful rays. However, when it occurs in the troposphere, the region of atmosphere closer to Earth’s surface, ozone is a damaging pollutant. Tropospheric-level ozone gas is created by a photochemical reaction between VOCs – emitted by vegetation and commonly found in substances such as paint and aerosols – and oxides of nitrogen, which are released when fossil fuels burn. Tropospheric ozone levels have been rising because a warming climate is creating optimal conditions for its formation.



“Ozone pollution can affect the timing and duration of flowering in such a way that the occurrence of flowering is asynchronous to the activities of pollinators,” said Agathokleous. “It can also change the color of flowers, disrupting the visual signals to pollinators. Ozone pollution can also directly react with pollen, decreasing its quality, but also indirectly changing the amount of pollen.” &nbsp;



The research, published in the journal <a href="https://www.cell.com/trends/ecology-evolution/home">Trends in Ecology &amp; Evolution</a>, also indicates that ozone affects pollinators directly by altering their olfactory learning ability, decreasing their recall of learned scents, and enhancing their response to new scents. Ozone may further decrease the proportion of active pollinators at any one time, a distress behavior that implies fewer potential foragers will be around to pollinate flowers.&nbsp;



“Changes in the composition of the volatile blends could also have severe implications to pollinators because they might not recognize host plants and their qualities in the same way they did in the past,” said Agathokleous. “Within plant tissues, ozone pollution could decrease the amount of nutrients that are essential to insects, increase the abundance of chemicals that are harmful to insects ingesting them, and degrade the overall quality of plant tissues.”



The study authors conclude that there may be some significant ecological consequences of ozone pollution for the world’s pollinating insects. Ozone concentrations are usually lower during the night but, since night-time ozone levels are increasing, ozone pollution may affect nocturnal pollinators more than previously thought. They state that a new generation of interdisciplinary research programs is needed to evaluate the resilience of plant–pollinator interactions in areas exposed to ozone pollution.&nbsp;



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Ozone pollution threatens the health of plants and pollinators

In recent decades, ozone levels in the lower troposphere have...

Contrary to what one might expect, melting polar ice that introduces fresh water into the sea will not lead to sea-level rises of equal magnitude throughout the world’s <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/even-the-most-remote-oceans-are-polluted-with-microplastics/">oceans</a>. Instead, as an ice sheet melts, it leaves a unique pattern of meltwater distribution behind, known as a sea-level fingerprint. Although the concept of sea-level fingerprints has already been factored into&nbsp;current <a href="https://www.nature.com/news/huge-arctic-report-ups-estimates-of-sea-level-rise-1.21911">models used to predict future changes in sea level, </a>actual observational measurements of the accuracy of these predictions have been difficult to make.&nbsp;



A new study, led by researchers from <a href="https://www.lanl.gov/">Los Alamos National Laboratory</a>, has now used high-resolution satellite observations of the Earth’s high latitude areas to test model predictions and assess the risks of sea-level rise to coastal communities. The research takes a major step forward in predicting probable consequences of rising ocean levels by confirming the theoretical predictions and computational models that are used to forecast sea-level changes as the climate warms.&nbsp;



“Using&nbsp;sea-surface-height observations from satellites in the way&nbsp;we have done independently verifies observations of Arctic and Greenland ice-mass loss and allows us to tease apart contributions to global&nbsp;sea-level rise from individual ice sheets and glacier systems,” said Sophie Coulson, a postdoctoral researcher in fluid dynamics and geophysics at Los Alamos National Laboratory, and lead author on the paper.&nbsp;



“Accurately predicting regional patterns of sea-level change is absolutely central to understanding the impacts of future climate change and forecasting hazards,” she emphasized.&nbsp;



The theoretical models predict that sea level will actually fall in the immediate vicinity around a melting ice sheet. This is because ice sheets and glaciers have a small gravitational pull on the water that surrounds them and the strength of this force is related to the mass of the ice. As an ice sheet or glacier melts, it loses mass and therefore the gravitational pull it exerts on the nearby ocean water becomes weaker. This causes the sea level to fall.&nbsp;



In addition, as ice sheets melt, complex geological processes cause the surrounding seawater that is no longer attracted so strongly to the diminishing ice mass to move away towards oceans in the middle and low latitudes of the world. This means that sea levels are likely to rise faster in the tropical and subtropical regions, far away from the actual location of the ice sheet or glacier. For example, sea-level rise in California and Florida, generated by the melting of the Antarctic ice sheet, is predicted to be as much as 52 percent greater than average sea-level rise across the rest of the world.



“As this melting continues, and the water is redistributed around the global oceans, sea level does not rise uniformly," explained Coulson. "And since every glacier and ice sheet has a unique pattern of sea-level change, these patterns have come to be known as sea-level fingerprints. But despite over half a century of research, these fingerprints have never been unambiguously detected.”



In the current study, Coulson’s search focused on satellite observations of sea-surface height in the oceans surrounding the Greenland ice sheet over the last three decades. The research team expected to see a lowering of sea level in waters around the ice sheet as it is melting and losing mass. Their models also predicted that progressively higher levels of sea rise would be recorded in oceans further away from Greenland, as the ocean water is freed from gravitational attraction to the ice sheet and heads out into the open ocean.&nbsp;



“We predicted what the pattern of sea-level change would be around Greenland using new estimates of ice melting in the area,” Coulson said. “When we then compared this pattern to satellite observations of sea-level change the fit was remarkable. It was an incredible eureka moment for us when the team saw it – ‘there it is, the sea-level fingerprint!’”



In the past it was not possible to detect sea-level fingerprints in the Arctic and Antarctic regions because the sea-surface-heights were not measured around polar ice sheets at these high latitudes. The research team on the&nbsp;Science&nbsp;paper took advantage of processed satellite observations that extend to much higher latitudes than previously possible, where the fingerprint signal is the largest. The team processed this satellite data using a powerful new technique to remove the variability due to ocean dynamics.



The new study confirms the accuracy of the geophysical predictions of sea-level change and adds confidence to projections of sea-level rise across the next decades and century. As Coulson says, “It’s a powerful and sensitive approach to monitoring ice sheets and glaciers in our warming world.”



The results of the analysis are published in the journal Science.&nbsp;



Image Credit: Courtesy of Dr. Laurence C. Smith of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Elusive sea-level “fingerprint” detected around Greenland ice sheet

Contrary to what one might expect, melting polar ice that...

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The Galápagos Islands in the eastern Pacific Today&#8217;s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the Galápagos Islands, a volcanic archipelago in the Pacific Ocean. This region is one of the most famous places on the planet for viewing wildlife.
The Galápagos Islands are home to many native plants and animals that cannot be found anywhere else in the world, including giant tortoises and sea lions. 
When Charles Darwin visited the islands in 1835, his wildlife observations inspired the theory of evolution by natural selection. In 1959, the Ecuadorian government made the entire archipelago a national park to protect its unique diversity. 
The archipelago is made up of 13 major islands and several smaller islands and islets across 60,000 square kilometers of ocean. According to ESA, repeated volcanic eruptions and ongoing seismic activity have helped form the rugged mountain landscape of the islands. The older names remained in use in English-language publications, including Herman Melville&#8217;s The Encantadas of 1854.  Therefore Galapagos owns one of the provinces of Ecuador, made up of three cantons that consist  the names of its most populated islands, which are San Cristóbal, Santa Cruz and Isabela. 
The largest of the Galapagos Islands, Isabela, was formed when multiple Volcanism has been continuous on the Galápagos Islands for at least 20 million years, and possibly  even longer. The mantle plume beneath the east side of volcanoes merged into one single land mass. The Galápagos Archipelago is characterized by large contemporaneous volcanoes, some with plume magma sources, others from the <a title="Asthenosphere" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asthenosphere">asthenosphere</a>, 
Video Credit: European Space Agency 
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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer