Hurricane Gustav off New England

Hurricane Gustav off New England After hugging the Eastern seaboard for several days as a tropical storm, the storm called Gustav finally made Hurricane status on September 11, 2002, as it moved away from the Maryland and Delaware coasts. The storm eventually made landfall in southwestern Newfoundland on September 12, 2002. This image was acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument on the Aqua satellite.

Hurricane Gustav was the second most destructive hurricane of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season. The seventh tropical cyclone, third hurricane, and second major hurricane of the season, Gustav caused serious damage and casualties in Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, the Cayman Islands, Cuba and the United States. Gustav caused at least $8.31 billion in damages. Once into the Gulf, Gustav gradually weakened because of increased wind shear and dry air. It weakened to a Category 2 hurricane late on August 31, and remained at that intensity until landfall on the morning of September 1 near Cocodrie, Louisiana.^[4] Weakening continued, and Gustav weakened to a tropical storm that evening and to a tropical depression the next day as it meandered around the south-central US. The weak system became extratropical on September 4 and was absorbed by another low on September 5

Credit: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC