At 11 a.m. EDT today, August 2, the National Hurricane Center proclaimed that the low pressure area located about 1050 miles west-southwest of the Cape Verde Islands, near latitude 12.6 north and longitude 41.1 west had organized into Tropical Depression Four (TD4).

TD4 had maximum sustained winds near 35 mph, and is moving toward the west-northwest near 17 mph. It is expected to continue moving toward the west-northwest with an increase in forward speed is expected over the next couple of days.

When the TRMM satellite flew overhead on August 2 at 0205 UTC (August 1 at 10:05 p.m. EDT) it captured the rainfall rates within the storm.

The NHC says that TD4 will likely strengthen into a tropical storm within 24 hours. If TD4 does strengthen it would become the third named storm of the Atlantic Ocean 2010 hurricane season and would be called Colin.

The fourth tropical depression of the western Pacific Ocean strengthened into a tropical storm and was named Chanthu today. Infrared imagery from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument that flies aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite captured areas of strong convection from northeast to southwest, but convection isn’t showing on the storm’s west side.

At 1500 UTC (11 a.m. EDT) on July 20, Tropical Storm Chanthu’s maximum sustained winds were near 46 mph (40 knots). Chantu was located about 240 nautical miles south of Hong Kong, China, near 18.6 North and 114.3 East. It was moving west-northwestward near 8 mph (7 knots), and is forecast to make a landfall south of Hong Kong by 1800 UTC (3 p.m. EDT) tomorrow, July 21 or 3 a.m. local time/Hong Kong on July 22.

The Hong Kong Observatory has posted Standby Signal, No. 1. That means that a tropical cyclone now centred within about (~500 miles) 800 kilometers of Hong Kong.

The Genesis and Rapid Intensification Processes (GRIP) experiment will take place from Aug. 15 to Sept. 30 and employ three NASA aircraft flying over the Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea to try to answer some of the basic but still lingering questions about how and why hurricanes form and strengthen.

Hurricanes before to gather data on precipitation, winds, convection, temperature and other factors that are known cyclone ingredients. The logistical demands of doing so have only allowed for two to four hours of data collection at a time, a snapshot of a storm that could spin for days. But for the first time, scientists will fly an unmanned drone, outfitted with 3-D radar, a microwave radiometer and other instruments over tropical systems for up to 20 consecutive hours.

He Global Hawk’s instruments have the capability to peer through cloud tops and measure the internal structure of a storm – will offer new insights into the fundamentalquestions of hurricane genesis and intensification.

System 96L looks like an oval-shaped area of clouds in a recent visible satellite image from the GOES-13 satellite. The National Hurricane Center noted that it now has a 50% chance of development into a tropical depression by sometime on Thursday.

A visible image of System 96L on July 7 at 1732 UTC (1:32 p.m. EDT), and its broad area of clouds covered the western Gulf of Mexico, stretching from the Yucatan Peninsula north to the Texas coast.

System 96L is an elongated area of low pressure and is moving west-northwestward at 10 to 15 mph. Its center is near 23.3 North latitude and 93.3 West longitude. Shower and thunderstorm activity has ramped up and is more concentrated about 300 miles east-southeast of the Texas/Mexico border. That increase in showers and thunderstorms is happening near the southern part of the low pressure area.

The  National Weather Service said that “Conditions appear conducive for development and a tropical depression could form before the system reaches the coast of northeastern Mexico or southern Texas on Thursday.”

Even if System 96L doesn’t develop into a tropical depression, it is still forecast to bring locally heavy rains and gusty winds to portions of eastern Texas and northeastern Mexico during the next few days.

Outside of System 96L,  tropical cyclone formation is not expected anywhere else in the  Atlantic, Caribbean or  Gulf of Mexico during the next 48 hours.

Tropical Storm Alex intensified by 11 p.m. EDT on June 29 and became the first hurricane of the 2010 Atlantic Ocean Hurricane Season. NASA satellites continue to provide visible, infrared and microwave satellite data to forecasters to help the National Hurricane Center forecast Alex’s intensity and track, and NASA’s Aqua satellite flew over Alex hours before it became a hurricane yesterday.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument that flies aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite is one of those NASA instruments that provide forecasters data. MODIS captured a visible image of Alex on June 29 at 3:35 p.m. EDT as it churned over the Gulf of Mexico, and provided a high resolution image of this large storm’s extent in the Gulf of Mexico.