ESSIC Post-doctoral Associate Michael Peterson created an animation loop of Hurricane Harvey showing cloud cover and optical lightning emissions on August 25-26, 2017. Peterson combined infrared imagery from GOES-16’s Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) as well as imagery from the satellite's Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM), which observes total lightning (both in-cloud and cloud-to-ground) day and night across the Western Hemisphere. The loop received considerable social media attention via the National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) dissemination channels.
![Satellite seasonal temperature difference maps indicate how the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem and its organisms may respond to the temperature changes. Here, the maps show warmer than average water temperatures from January through March 2020, cooler than average from April through June, near average July through September, and slightly warmer than average October through December. The long-term baseline is from the years 2008-2019.]](https://essic.umd.edu/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/rv-chesapeake2-150x150.jpg)
Tracking Water Temperature with Satellites
September 18, 2025
