As Hurricane Michael barrels towards the East Coast, an eerie image from Tuesday’s satellite views of the storm was captured. At the center of the hurricane, appears to be a likeness of a human skull.
According to USA Today, some weather forecasters tasked with tracking hurricane Michaels’ progress saw the image of a skull at the center of the now-Category 4 hurricane, which has sustained winds of nearly 130 mph as of early Wednesday. And weather forecasters weren’t the only ones who took notice. The image does look eerily like that of a skull.
The National Hurricane Center is currently anticipating the possibility of a stronger storm because water temperatures in the northeastern Gulf of Mexico remain warm for autumn, said WeatherTiger meteorologist Ryan Truchelut of Tallahassee, Florida. Satellite views of Hurricane Michael seemed to warn that it will become a Category 4 storm before its eye hits the Florida Panhandle or the state’s Big Bend area in early afternoon Wednesday.
“#Michael has that ‘skull’ appearance on IR (infrared) satellite this morning as the eye is beginning to clear out through the CDO,” meteorologist Jim Dickey at WZVN-TV, Fort Myers, Florida, tweeted Tuesday morning. CDO stands for central dense overcast, which in weather speak means the thunderstorm clouds that surround the eye of a hurricane. Dickey wasn’t the only one to tweet about the satellite imagery either.
Is image of skull showing up at the center of Hurricane Michael? https://t.co/3Ne8Np2ZtG pic.twitter.com/LOf0IAPFlE
— WUSA9 (@wusa9) October 10, 2018
Ugly “face” from Hurricane #MICHAEL #Michael from different models that I took from meteorologists pic.twitter.com/zp6GKng3M6
— Norma Saldivar (@SaldivarN80) October 10, 2018
The effect seems to be a common one, as AccuWeather noted a similarity to Hurricane Matthew on October 6, 2017, when an infrared satellite image passing over Haiti went viral after seeming to show a creepy skull.
Hurricane Michael is now just hours away from striking Florida and is expected to be one of the biggest storms to ever hit the area. According to The Guardian, FEMA administrator, Brock Long warned at a press conference Wednesday morning that the storm will be one of the worst that southern Georgia has seen in decades, and people there should “wake up and pay attention.”
Hopefully, those in the path of this monster storm have prepared for it. In parts of Georgia and Florida, it’s likely very power will be out for several weeks, Long said. North and South Carolina are also expected to see rainfall from the storm, which is a concern because rivers there have not yet receded to their normal levels after flooding from Hurricane Florence. “Unfortunately it’s going to be a reality and it’s going to cause problems,” Long said.
