Real-time coverage of severeStorms event on Pandita Data.
⛈️ OPEN LIVE 3D EARTHQUAKE MAPThe ocean swallows the horizon. Wind shear tears clouds into fractured ribbons. A merchant vessel 400 nautical miles northeast of Brisbane reports sustained winds of 165 kilometers per hour—gusts that bend steel railings into abstract art. The barometric pressure has fallen to 938 millibars. Somewhere in that churning mass of water vapor and kinetic fury, atmospheric pressure gradients are accelerating air masses toward the center with the intensity of a wound spring. This is Tropical Cyclone 28P, spinning over the Coral Sea on March 24, 2026. Landfall is 48 hours away. The mathematics of destruction are already written in the air.
Tropical cyclones are heat engines—vast atmospheric machines that convert ocean warmth into rotational kinetic energy. TC 28P formed over water where sea surface temperature exceeded 26.5°C, the critical threshold where warm, moist air rises faster than the surrounding atmosphere can compensate. As air parcels ascend, they cool adiabatically. The water vapor they carry condenses, releasing latent heat—roughly 2,500 joules per gram. This heat powers continued updrafts, creating a positive feedback loop.
The Coriolis effect, negligible near the equator but powerful at 23.6°S, deflects these rising air currents rightward (in the Southern Hemisphere), spinning them into a counterclockwise vortex. Wind shear—the change in wind speed and direction with altitude—was low when 28P developed, allowing the system to organize into the tight, symmetrical structure visible on satellite. The eye, a zone of descending air roughly 40 kilometers across, is surrounded by the eyewall: the storm's most violent region, where updrafts exceed 20 meters per second.
Our real-time 3D weather simulation ingests data from NOAA's GOES satellites, which observe cloud-top temperature, atmospheric moisture, and wind patterns every 10–15 minutes. The Japan Meteorological Agency and Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command (JTWC) feed TC position, central pressure, and maximum sustained wind estimates into numerical weather prediction models—primarily the GFS (Global Forecast System) and HWRF (Hurricane Weather Research and Forecasting model). Pandita's visualization renders these model outputs as a rotating 3D globe, allowing you to see wind vectors, pressure anomalies, and precipitation rates layer by layer. Watch the eyewall contract as 28P organizes. See the outflow pattern—the upper-level divergence that releases air away from the storm's top. This is how meteorologists read the system's mood 5–7 days in advance.
Storm surge risk: 2–4 meters above mean sea level, particularly in Moreton Bay and inlets north of Brisbane. Rainfall: 200–400 mm in 24 hours, with localized extremes exceeding 600 mm—a deluge that triggers flash flooding in steep terrain and urban drainage systems.