Mountains Soar Above the Appalachians in this Dramatic NASA Photo

Except these are mountains made of water, not rock! Taken from an altitude of 65,000 feet, the image above shows enormous storm cells swirling high over the mountains of western North Carolina on May 23, 2014. It was captured from one of NASA’s high-altitide ER-2 aircraft during a field research flight as part of the Integrated Precipitation and Hydrology Experiment (IPHEx) campaign.

The photo was NASA’s Image of the Day for June 19, 2014.

Visualization of the GPM Core Observatory satellite (NASA/Britt Griswold)

For six weeks the IPHEx campaign team from NASA, NOAA, and Duke University set up ground stations and flew ER-2 missions over the southeastern U.S., collecting data on weather and rainfall that will be used to supplement and calibrate data gathered by the GPM Core Observatory launched in February.

By the time its role in IPHEx was completed on June 16, the Lockheed ER-2 aircraft had flown more than 95 hours during 18 flights over North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and Tennessee. Its high-altitude capabilities allow researchers to safely fly above storm systems, taking measurements like a satellite would.

Learn more about the ER-2 flights here, and read more about the IPHEx campaign on Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering site here.

Source: NASA

NASA’s ER-2 at the Armstrong Flight Research Center’s Building 703 in Palmdale, CA (NASA/Tom Tschida)
Jason Major

A graphic designer in Rhode Island, Jason writes about space exploration on his blog Lights In The Dark, Discovery News, and, of course, here on Universe Today. Ad astra!

Recent Posts

Construction of Roman Continues With the Addition of its Sunshade

NASA continues to progress with the development of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (RST),…

2 hours ago

A Flaming Flower in the Large Magellanic Cloud

Our neighbour, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), is rich in gas and dust and hosts…

3 hours ago

A Bola Robot Could Provide Stable Jumping Capability on Low-Gravity Bodies

New research on locomotion techniques that could be used in space exploration is constantly coming…

5 hours ago

White Dwarfs Could Be More Habitable Than We Thought

White dwarfs are the remnants of once brilliant main sequence stars like our Sun. They're…

7 hours ago

Dramatically Decreasing the Time it Takes to Measure Asteroid Distances

We all know that asteroids are out there, that some of them come dangerously close…

9 hours ago

Should Astronauts Add Jumping to their Workout Routine?

It’s a familiar sight to see astronauts on board ISS on exercise equipment to minimise…

14 hours ago