The Rapid Intensification of Typhoon Nestor

 This image shows Western Pacific Tropical Storm Nestor at 2309 UTC June 7, 1997. Notice the large semicircular white band depicting the storm's main thunderstorm activity is wrapped a little more than halfway around the circulation center located near the southwest end of the band. At this time, Nestor had winds of about 50 mph and was slowly intensifying. (195K JPG)

 This image shows Typhoon Nestor 24 hours later at 2309 UTC June 8, 1997. Notice the rather drastic change in the cloud structure! The typhoon now shows a small eye embedded in a well-defined central dense overcast (CDO), with an outer band of thunderstorms wrapping all the way around the CDO. Nestor now has maximum sustained winds of 105 mph and is rapidly intensifying toward a peak intensity of 160 mph. These two images show an excellent example of how fast a tropical cyclone can strengthen under the right conditions. (229K JPG)

These images are courtesy of the Naval Research Laboratory in Monterey, CA. Similar real-time images can be found on their Tropical Images and Movies page and on their Tropical Cyclone page. For Western Pacific warnings and other typhoon information, check out the Joint Typhoon Warning Center.

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