Regional And Mesoscale Meteorology Team
Daily Satellite Discussion
Thursday September 25, 1997
At that time, Nora was moving northward and entering southern Arizona. The red arrows in Figure 1 point to the ridge line in Baja California. The cloud field to the west of the tip of the arrows terminates at the ridge line because the flow had an upslope component (cloud forming due to lifting) to the west and downslope (cloud erroding due to sinking) to the east.
When the center moved over the mountains of Baja California, the cloud top temperatures warmed as the storm lost its low-level moisture. The cloud top temperatures fell rapidly as the center moved over the warm waters in the northern portion of the Gulf of California before warming again as the storm moved inland.
Louie Grasso