Hurricane Milton eye spotted from space, how does eye determine intensity of storm

As Hurricane Milton nears Florida, NASA shared space images of the storm. Initially a Category 5, it poses serious threats.

NASA astronaut Matthew Dominick shared breathtaking images and videos of Hurricane Milton from space as the massive storm moved toward central Florida.

Dominick captured the footage through the window of the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule Endeavour, which is currently docked at the International Space Station (ISS).

The astronaut posted the photos of the dangerous storm from orbit on X (formerly Twitter). “We flew over Hurricane Milton about 90 minutes ago. Here is the view out the Dragon Endeavour window,” Dominick wrote on Tuesday morning.

“Expect lots of images from this window as this is where I’m sleeping while we wait to undock and return to Earth.”

How does the eye determine magnitude of storm?

The eye of a hurricane is encircled by the eyewall, a ring of towering clouds that brings the most severe weather and strongest winds of the storm. The clearer and more well-defined the eye and its surrounding eyewall, the more powerful and intense the cyclone becomes. A smaller eye is a sign of a storm with huge magnitude, like what we can see in NASA's video.

Hurricane Milton, which initially intensified to a Category 5 storm over the Gulf of Mexico, is projected to make landfall on Florida’s west coast by Wednesday evening.

The National Hurricane Center has warned that the Tampa and Sarasota areas could experience life-threatening storm surges of 10 to 15 feet. Officials have issued mandatory evacuation orders for large portions of the state’s west coast as a precaution. Most of the Florida residents have already evacuated the Tampa Bay region.

Although Milton was downgraded to a Category 4 storm early Tuesday, by the afternoon, it had regained strength and was once again upgraded to a Category 5 hurricane, according to reports from The Associated Press.

President Joe Biden, along with local officials, urged residents to take the storm seriously and heed evacuation orders. “If you’re under an evacuation order, you should evacuate now. Now, now, now. You should have already evacuated. It’s a matter of life and death,” Biden said in a statement.

Veteran TV meteorologist, John Morales,, who earlier warned about the Hurricane Helene, stated, “It's just an incredible, incredible, incredible hurricane.”