Hurricane Matthew hits NASA's launch centre

Oct 08, 2016, 00:50

NASA has provided incredible views of Hurricane Matthew from space.

Hurricane Matthew, the category four storm that has already claimed more than 100 lives in the Caribbean, is bearing down on the coast of Florida - and NASA's Kennedy Space Center looks likely to take an absolute hammering.

The external tank for Space Shuttle Atlantis mission STS-129 is transported into the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center August 4, 2009, in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The spaceport has always been the launch center for NASA astronauts; the Apollo moon missions lifted off from KSC, for example, as did space shuttle flights to Earth orbit.

NASA closed KSC yesterday (Oct. 6) and today to prepare for, and weather, Matthew's arrival. The eye of the storm is now moving toward Cape Canaveral. However, with wind gusts up to 120 miles per hour Friday morning, it still posed a significant risk for those in its path.

"It could have been a lot worse", National Hurricane Service's Matt Volkmer told Orlando Sentinel.

"We can see roof damage".

"Kennedy Space Center is now in HurrCon 1 status, meaning a hurricane is imminent", NASA's Brian Dunbar said in an update on Thursday.

"GPM had a recent overpass at 3:06 p.m. EDT that shows that Matthew is undergoing an eyewall replacement cycle", said Scott Braun, research meteorologist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

Hurricane Matthew is the Category 4 storm, and recorded as the strongest hurricane ever threatened the U.S.in decades.

The eye of Hurricane Matthew at 11 a.m. Friday was about 95 miles southeast of Jacksonville, Fla., and the northernmost rain bands from the storm were approaching the southeastern coast of SC. But it didn't have the potential to create damage as Matthew does, which forced over two million people to evacuate, as reported by Washington Post.

"Storm surge has been observed to be relatively minimal, limited to localized portions of the space center", Diller said.

"We've had some close calls, but as far as I know it's the first time we've had the threat of a direct hit", Diller wrote in an email before the storm. The team is reporting to the emergency operation personnel, who worked in the command center at Complex 39 Launch Control Center.