Hurricane Katrina (12L) off Florida Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid
Response Team, NASA/GSFC Hurricane Katrina had just re-emerged
over the Gulf of Mexico after its first United States landfall
over Florida on August 26, 2005, when the Moderate Resolution
Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite
acquired this image. Katrina was a tropical storm after it cut
across southern Florida, but regained hurricane status within an
hour of reaching open water. The storm had been over the water
for nearly fourteen hours when this image was taken at 1:45 p.m.
U.S. Central time, and had already assumed the tight swirling
shape of a growing hurricane. Within hours of this image,
Katrina would grow into a Category 3 storm. When it came ashore
on August 29, it became one of the deadliest and costliest
storms to hit the United States.