TRMM Sees Powerful Tropical Cyclone Alenga
Tropical Cyclone Alenga's wind speeds increased to a maximum of about 90kts (~104 mph). Alenga had weakened from this maximum intensity when the TRMM satellite passed directly above in the early evening of 8 December 2011 at 1005 UTC. A precipitation analysis from TRMM's Microwave Imager (TMI) and Precipitation Radar (PR) are shown above overlaid on a Visible/Infrared image from Visible and InfraRed Scanner (VIRS) data. This analysis shows that very heavy rainfall of over 50 mm/hr (~2 inches) was being produced by intense storms in Alenga's eye wall.
The image below shows a 3-D vertical slice through Alenga. TRMM's radar was able to see through Alenga's cloud cover and reveal that very powerful storms in the center of the tropical cyclone had strong radar reflectivity values of over 53 dBZ.