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Tropical Storm Lee
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/GSFC/USGS.
Aquarius Detects Possible Effects of Tropical Storm Lee
[09-Dec-2009] Tropical Storm Lee made landfall over New Orleans on Sept. 2-3, 2011, with predicted rainfall of 15 to 20 inches (38 to 51 centimeters) over southern Louisiana. This coincided with a surge in discharge from the Mississippi River around that time (bottom chart). NASA's Aquarius instrument on the Aquarius/SAC-D spacecraft detected a corresponding low-salinity feature, as seen in the Aquarius weekly composite image (Aug 28 - Sept 3) in the top diagram (the low-salinity feature is the blue color region between the Mississippi River delta and the Florida panhandle). This preliminary finding is likely the result of both the increased river discharge and heavy rainfall from the storm directly on the sea surface. The low-salinity feature is gone by late October, as seen in the middle image. Original images: Photojournal.

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