1. The creator of Fortnite has laid off more than 1,000 staff – despite billions in revenue  The Guardian
2. Today’s layoffs  Epic Games
3. Live-service games are such a mess even Fortnite is struggling  The Verge
4. Epic Games cuts 1,000 jobs as Fortnite 'magic' fades in 'extreme' market conditions  Fox Business
5. Epic Games to lay off more than 1,000 workers, including 211 in Triangle amid Fortnite downturn  ABC11 Raleigh-Durham

1. The Best Amazon Big Spring Sale Apple Deals We've Found So Far  PCMag
2. Best Amazon Big Spring Sale Apple deals: iPad Air, AirPods Pro 3, and more  Mashable
3. Amazon is practically giving away Apple bestsellers with up to $300 off  New York Post
4. Amazon Prime Day 'Big Spring Sale' Introduces Major Discounts on AirPods, iPads, AirTag, and Much More  MacRumors
5. I Tracked Down All of the Best Apple Deals in Amazon's Spring Sale  IGN

1. Ring adds 4K to its battery-powered video doorbells  Engadget
2. Ring finally brings 4K video to its battery-powered doorbell camera  The Verge
3. Ring launches doorbell with best picture ever and accessory for continuous power  The Sun
4. Don't buy a Ring Doorbell until you see this impressive upgrade from Amazon  Daily Express
5. Ring Expands Doorbell Portfolio with New Battery and Wired Models Featuring 2K and 4K Video  cepro.com

1. Dell made its new Pro laptops thinner and tweaked their naming scheme, again  The Verge
2. First Look: Dell's Pro Precision 5 14S and 16S Are Its Thinnest, Lightest Mobile Workstations Ever  PCMag
3. Dell (DELL) Hasn’t Given Up on The Dream of AI Personal Computers. Its Stock Is Surging  TipRanks
4. Dell slims Pro laptops, boosts battery and cooling  theregister.com
5. Six reasons you'll be proud to be seen with a Dell Pro business laptop  TechRadar

1. Big Battlemage Is Here – Intel Unveils Arc Pro B70 & B65 GPUs, Up To 32 GB Memory & 367 TOPS For AI  Wccftech
2. Intel Targets AI Workstations With Memory-Stuffed Arc Pro B70 and B65 GPUs  PCMag
3. Intel’s long-awaited big GPU is just for AI and starts at nearly $1,000.  The Verge
4. Intel Arc Pro B70 Shows Up on Newegg With April Release Date and $949.99 Price  TechPowerUp
5. The Arc Pro B70 is twice as good as the NVIDIA RTX Pro 4000.  GameGPU

6 Min Read

NASA Webb, Hubble Share Most Comprehensive View of Saturn to Date

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble Space Telescope have teamed up to capture new views of Saturn, revealing the planet in strikingly different ways. Observing in complementary wavelengths of light, the two space observatories provide scientists with a richer, more layered understanding of the gas giant’s atmosphere.

Both sense sunlight reflected from Saturn’s banded clouds and hazes, but where Hubble reveals subtle color variations across the planet, Webb’s infrared view senses clouds and chemicals at many different depths in the atmosphere, from the deep clouds to the tenuous upper atmosphere.

Image: Saturn (Webb NIRCam and Hubble WFC3/UVIS)

Together, scientists can effectively ‘slice’ through Saturn’s atmosphere at multiple altitudes, like peeling back the layers of an onion. Each telescope tells a different part of Saturn’s story, and the observations together help researchers understand how Saturn’s atmosphere works as a connected three-dimensional system. Both complement previous observations done by NASA’s Cassini orbiter during its time studying the Saturnian system from 1997 to 2017.

The Hubble image seen here was captured as part of a more than a decade long monitoring program called OPAL (Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy) in August 2024, while the Webb image was captured a few months later using Director’s Discretionary Time. 

The newly released images highlight features from Saturn’s busy atmosphere.

In the Webb image, a long-lived jet stream known as the “ribbon wave” meanders across the northern mid-latitudes, influenced by otherwise undetectable atmospheric waves. Just below that, a small spot represents a lingering remnant from the “Great Springtime Storm” of 2010 to 2012.  Several other storms dotting the southern hemisphere of Saturn are visible in Webb’s image, as well. 

Image: Saturn (Webb NIRCam Image)

Image: Saturn (WFC3/UVIS)

All these features are shaped by powerful winds and waves beneath the visible cloud deck, making Saturn a natural laboratory for studying fluid dynamics under extreme conditions.

Several of the pointed edges of Saturn’s iconic hexagon-shaped jet stream at its north pole, discovered by NASA’s Voyager spacecraft in 1981, are also faintly visible in both images. It remains one of the solar system’s most intriguing weather patterns. Its persistence over decades highlights the stability of certain large-scale atmospheric processes on giant planets. These are likely the last high-resolution looks we’ll see of the famous hexagon until the 2040’s, as the northern pole enters winter and will shift into darkness for 15 years.

In Webb’s infrared observations, Saturn’s poles appear distinctly grey-green, indicating light emitting at wavelengths around 4.3 microns. This distinct feature could come from a layer of high-altitude aerosols in Saturn’s atmosphere that scatters light differently at those latitudes. Another possible explanation is auroral activity, as charged molecules interacting with the planet’s magnetic field can produce glowing emissions near the poles. 

Image: Saturn (Webb NIRCam Wide Image)

NASA’s Hubble and Webb have already explored Saturn’s auroras, provided insights into Jupiter’s spectacular auroras also seen with Hubble, confirmed the auroras of Uranus glimpsed in 2011 by Hubble, and detected Neptune’s auroras for the first time with Webb.

In Webb’s infrared image, the rings are extremely bright because they are made of highly reflective water ice. In both images, we’re seeing the sunlit face of the rings, a little less so in the Hubble image, hence the shadows visible underneath on the planet.

There are also subtle ring features such as spokes and structure in the B ring (the thick central region of the rings) that appear differently between the two observatories. The F ring, the outermost ring, looks thin and crisp in the Webb image, while it only slightly glows in the Hubble image.

Saturn’s orbit around the Sun, combined with the position of Earth in its annual orbit, determines our changing viewing angle of Saturn’s face and ring.

These 2024 observations, taken 14 weeks apart, show the planet moving from northern summer toward the 2025 equinox. As Saturn transitions into southern spring, and later southern summer in the 2030’s, Hubble and Webb will have progressively better views of that hemisphere.

Hubble’s observations of Saturn for decades have built a record of its evolving atmosphere. Programs like OPAL, with its annual monitoring, are allowing scientists to track storms, banding patterns, and seasonal shifts over time. Webb now adds powerful infrared capabilities to this ongoing record, extending what researchers can measure about Saturn’s atmospheric structure and dynamic processes.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).

To learn more about Webb, visit:

https://nasa.gov/webb

The Hubble Space Telescope has been operating for over three decades and continues to make ground-breaking discoveries that shape our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope and mission operations. Lockheed Martin Space, based in Denver, also supports mission operations at Goddard. The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, conducts Hubble science operations for NASA.

To learn more about Hubble, visit:

https://nasa.gov/hubble

Downloads & Related Information

The following sections contain links to download this article’s images and videos in all available resolutions followed by related information links, media contacts, and if available, research paper and Spanish translation links.

Related Images & Videos

Saturn (Webb NIRCam and Hubble WFC3/UVIS)

Complementary views of Saturn from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble Space Telescope show a dynamic planet with atmospheric features, orbiting moons, and bright rings.

Saturn (Webb NIRCam Image)

Captured Nov. 29, 2024 by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, this infrared view of Saturn shows its glowing icy rings and layered atmosphere. Several moons are visible, including Janus, Dione, and Enceladus.

Saturn (WFC3/UVIS)

Captured Aug. 22, 2024 by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, this visible-light view of Saturn reveals the planet’s softly banded atmosphere and iconic rings. Several moons are also visible, labeled Janus, Mimas, and Epimetheus.

Saturn (Webb NIRCam Wide Image)

A wider view of Saturn from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope shows six of Saturn’s larger moons, including the largest, Titan, at far left.

Saturn (Webb NIRCam and Hubble WFC3/UVIS Compass Image)

These images of Saturn, captured by NASA’s James Webb and Hubble Spaces Telescopes, shows compass arrows, scale bar, and color key for reference.

Related Links

Read more: NASA’s Saturn webpage

Read more: Exploring Our Solar System with Webb

Watch: Exploring Our Solar System with Dr. Amy Simon

Read more: Webb’s Titan Forecast: Partly Cloudy With Occasional Methane Showers

Watch: ViewSpace: Image Tour: Saturn

More Webb News

More Hubble News

More Webb Images

More Hubble Images

Webb Science Themes

Hubble Science Themes

Webb Mission Page

Hubble Mission Page

Keep Exploring

Related Topics

James Webb Space Telescope

Webb is the premier observatory of the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. It studies every phase in the…

Hubble Space Telescope

Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe.

Saturn

Our Solar System

For the first time, astronomers have directly measured the speed of superheated gas billowing from a cauldron of stellar activity at the heart of M82, a nearby galaxy undergoing an extraordinary burst of star formation.

The material is moving more than 2 million miles (over 3 million kilometers) per hour and appears to be the primary force driving a cooler, well-studied, galaxy-scale wind.

Researchers made the calculations using data from the Resolve instrument aboard the XRISM (X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission) spacecraft.

“The classic model of starburst galaxies like M82 suggests that shock waves from star formation and supernovae near the center heat gas, kick-starting a powerful wind,” said Erin Boettcher, an astrophysicist at the University of Maryland, College Park and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “Prior to XRISM, though, we didn’t have the ability to measure the velocities needed to test that hypothesis. Now we see the gas moving even faster than some models predict, more than enough to drive the wind all the way to the edge of the galaxy.”

A paper about the result, led by Boettcher, published Wednesday, March 25, in Nature. The XRISM mission is led by JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) in collaboration with NASA, along with contributions from ESA (European Space Agency). NASA and JAXA also codeveloped the Resolve instrument.

Sometimes called the Cigar galaxy, M82 is located 12 million light-years away in the northern constellation Ursa Major. Astronomers classify it as a starburst galaxy because it’s forming stars at a much higher rate than typical for its size — about 10 times faster than the Milky Way.  

M82 is well known for its extended, cool wind, which stretches out to 40,000 light-years and propels huge quantities of gas and dust. Scientists have studied it with many missions, including NASA’s Chandra, Webb, Hubble, and retired Spitzer space telescopes, trying to connect the dots between the stellar activity and the large-scale outflow.

Researchers particularly want to understand the role of cosmic rays. These high-speed charged particles are found throughout the cosmos and are accelerated by some of the same events scientists think produce winds like in M82. There’s a possibility they are a main source of outward pressure on the gas. 

The XRISM Resolve instrument’s high resolution and sensitivity allowed Boettcher and her colleagues to accurately measure the speed of the hot wind by looking at an X-ray signal from superheated iron in the galactic center.

The amount of X-ray light from iron and other elements told them the temperature — right within predictions at 45 million degrees Fahrenheit (25 million degrees Celsius). The heat exerts pressure on the gas and pushes it outward. This rushing from high pressure to low pressure forms the wind — the same reason winds blow through Earth’s atmosphere.

The broadness of iron spectral lines conveyed the hot wind’s speed. This works through Doppler shifting, the same phenomenon that causes the pitch of a sound, like a siren, to rise or fall due to the source’s motion toward or away from you. In the case of M82, the hot material near the center flies quickly in both directions, stretching out the iron’s spectral line. The amount of stretching reveals the iron’s velocity. The researchers found that the wind is a little faster than expected. Combined with the high temperature, it’s powerful enough to produce the cool wind without cosmic rays, although they may still be contributing.

The researchers calculate that the center of M82 expels enough gas every year to form seven stars with the mass of our Sun. This presents another puzzle.

“If the wind blows steadily at the speed we’ve measured, then we think it can power the larger, cooler wind by driving out four solar masses of gas a year. But XRISM tells us much more gas is moving outward,” said co-author Edmund Hodges-Kluck, an astronomer and XRISM team member at NASA Goddard. “Where do the three extra solar masses go? Do they escape out of the galaxy as hot gas some other way? We don’t know.”

The XRISM satellite’s observations of M82 will help improve models of starburst galaxies, which may help scientists answer these types of questions in the future. NASA’s contributions to international projects like XRISM are part of the agency’s efforts to innovate with ambitious science missions that will help us better understand how our cosmos works.

“Some of our early models of starburst galaxies were developed in the 1980s, and we’re finally able to test them in ways that weren’t possible before XRISM,” said co-author Skylar Grayson, a graduate student at Arizona State University in Tempe. “It provides opportunities to figure out why the model might not be capturing everything that’s going on in the real universe.”

By Jeanette Kazmierczak
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

Media Contact:
Claire Andreoli
301-286-1940
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

The highly competitive NASA Hubble Fellowship Program (NHFP) recently named 24 new fellows to its 2026 class. The NHFP enables outstanding postdoctoral scientists to pursue independent research in any area of NASA Astrophysics, using theory, observations, simulations, experimentation, or instrument development. Over 650 applicants vied for the 2026 fellowships, representing an oversubscription rate of 27 to 1. Each fellowship provides the awardee up to three years of support at a U.S. institution.

Once selected, fellows are named to one of three sub-categories corresponding to three broad scientific questions that NASA seeks to answer about the universe:

• How does the universe work? – Einstein Fellows
• How did we get here? – Hubble Fellows
• Are we alone? – Sagan Fellows

“The 2026 class of the NASA Hubble Fellowship Program is comprised of outstanding astrophysics researchers who will advance NASA’s pursuit of big questions about how the universe works, how it evolved over time, and whether we’re alone in it,” said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, Astrophysics Division director, NASA Headquarters, Washington. “Through their compelling research, and by sharing the products of that work with the broader community, this year’s fellows will once again play an important role in creating our future and in inspiring future generations of students to be a part of that future. These scientists across the country will enhance the impact of U.S. academic institutions and will further American leadership in space-based astrophysics research.”

The list below provides the names of the 2026 awardees, their fellowship host institutions, and their proposed research topics.

The 2026 NHFP Einstein Fellows are:

• Hollis Akins, Princeton University, “Charting the Growth of the First Supermassive Black Holes through ‘Little Red Dots’”
• Dhayaa Anbajagane, Stanford University, “Building a Multi-Probe Approach to Primordial Physics”
• Hannah Gulick, California Institute of Technology, “Probing Compact Object Demographics with a New Generation of Space-Based Observatories”
• Casey Lam, Carnegie Observatories, “A Portrait of Galactic Black Hole Demographics”
• Benjamin Lehmann, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, “New Tools for Dark Matter Physics”
• Sizheng Ma, Johns Hopkins University, “Listening Beyond the Ring: A New Paradigm for Black Hole Spectroscopy”
• Megan Masterson, Harvard University, “The Dynamic Astronomical Sky as a Probe of Supermassive Black Holes”
• Simona Miller, City University of New York, “Probing High-mass Binary Black Hole Formation and Fundamental Physics with the Remnants of our Cosmos’ Most Extreme Collisions”
• Martijn Oei, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, “The Widespread Impact of Megaparsec-scale Jets on the Cosmic Web”
• Frank Qu, Stanford University, “Mapping Dark Matter and Baryons Across the Universe with the Cosmic Microwave Background”

The 2026 NHFP Hubble Fellows are:

• James Beattie, Institute for Advanced Study, “The Glue Between the Stars: Unraveling Turbulence and Magnetism Across All Scales”
• Vedant Chandra, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, “Dark Matter at the Threshold of Galaxy Formation”
• Roman Gerasimov, University of Notre Dame, “New Frontiers in Galactic Archaeology”
• Jared Goldberg, Columbia University, “Massive Stars, Inside and Out: Bridging 1D and 3D Models of Stars and Supernovae”
• Vasily Kokorev, University of Texas at Austin, “The Cosmic Frontier: Uncovering Faint Galaxies that Ignited the Early Universe”
• Konstantinos Kritos, Stony Brook University, “Unveiling the Mystery of Massive Black Hole Seeds Through Gravitational and Electromagnetic Waves”
• Anna O’Grady, Carnegie Mellon University, “Stay Close to Go Far: Resolved Stellar Populations in Nearby Galaxies as Critical Benchmarks for Binary Evolution Models”
• David Setton, Johns Hopkins University, “A Multi-Wavelength View of Quenching Across Cosmic Time”

The 2026 NHFP Sagan Fellows are:

• Hayley Beltz, University of Kansas, “From Magnetic Fields to Measurable Signals: 3D MHD Modeling of Sub-Jovian Exoplanets”
• Rachel Bowens-Rubin, Harvard University, “From Ice Giants to Exorings: New Frontiers in Exoplanet Characterization with JWST & Roman CGI Direct Imaging”
• Collin Cherubim, University of Chicago, “Mass Fractionation in the Escaping Atmospheres of Small Planets, and the Hunt for Helium and Oxygen Worlds”
• Arvind Gupta, University of Arizona, “Securing the Doppler Legacy in the Hunt for Earth-like Exoplanets”
• Henrik Kneirim, California Institute of Technology, “Decoding the Formation of Extreme Giant Planets”
• Samantha Scibelli, National Radio Astronomy Observatory, “Zooming in on Prebiotic Chemistry at the Earliest Stage of Low-mass Star and Planet Formation”

An important part of the NHFP is the annual symposium, which allows Fellows the opportunity to present results of their research, and to meet each other and the scientific and administrative staff who manage the program. The 2025 symposium was held at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. Topics ranged from understanding the atmospheric chemistry of nearby, rocky planets with NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to observations of some of the earliest galaxies in the universe, and mapping the expansion of our universe with the latest data releases from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument. 

More information about the 2026 NHFP Fellows is available online.

The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, administers the NHFP on behalf of NASA, in collaboration with the Chandra X-ray Center at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in Pasadena, California.

Related Images & Videos

NHFP Photo Montage-2026 Fellows

The class of 2026 NHFP Fellows is shown in this photo montage. The Einstein Fellows appear in the blue hexagons, the Hubble Fellows in the purple hexagons, and the Sagan Fellows in the teal hexagons.

Keep Exploring

Discover More Topics From Hubble

Hubble Space Telescope

Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe.

Hubble Science Highlights

Hubble Images

Hubble News

Seattle and Portland, Oregon, are among the cloudiest cities in the United States. But that infamous cloud cover is no match for the U.S.-Indian Earth satellite NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar), which is designed to peer straight through clouds. Doing so allows scientists to study the Pacific Northwest’s natural landmarks and bustling port cities like never before.

Comparing the highly detailed imagery from the NISAR mission over time can reveal subtle changes in forests, wetlands, urban areas, and infrastructure. Radar images from the satellite — a joint effort between NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) — can also detect subtle motions associated with volcanic activity, glacier movement, slips along faults, and slow-moving landslides.

“The Pacific Northwest is home to millions of people and supports major industries from tech and aerospace to agriculture and forestry,” said remote sensing technologist Brandi Downs of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, who helped process the NISAR imagery. “This recent imagery highlights how NISAR data can support resource management, natural-hazard monitoring, and environmental decision-making.”

Built by JPL, NISAR’s L-band radar uses microwaves that can pass uninterrupted through clouds and, thanks to its 39-foot (12-meter) antenna reflector, provides a high level of detail for anyone who wants to understand how a region’s surface and natural resources are changing. These radar signals, sent toward the Earth’s surface, are reflected off the ground and back to the spacecraft, a phenomenon called backscatter. By measuring changes in the reflected signal, scientists can identify properties on the surface like moisture, vegetation, and variations in terrain.

Closer look

Radar images don’t capture true color the same way photographs do. Instead, the colors seen here represent different combinations and intensities of radar signals or their orientation. The latter is called polarization.

Captured Nov. 10, 2025, the Pacific Northwest imagery shows the waterways around Portland and Seattle, with the roadways and cityscapes built alongside them. Some of these areas are dotted in magenta due to radar signals strongly reflecting off flat surfaces like roads and buildings. The small areas of yellow may be produced by a range of factors, including land cover, soil moisture, and surface geometry.

With radar images like these, scientists can look for changes in backscatter over time to tell where trees and plants have been removed, regrown, or destroyed, and to estimate how much carbon is stored in forests. Monitoring the boundaries of water and wetlands provides insight into flood risks or shifts in river channels.

Yellow-green in the imagery indicates the forests and wetlands covering the region. Those are interrupted by the dark blue peaks of Mount Rainier and Mount Saint Helens, two of the best-known natural landmarks in the Pacific Northwest. Dark blue is representative of relatively smooth surfaces, including both water and exposed mountaintops. Near the foot of each mountain are patches of purple squares cut into the lighter-green vegetation. Their precise right angles indicate that they’re human-made, and most likely the effect of forests being thinned or vegetation growing back after having been thinned in the past.

“A single radar image is a snapshot of the surface conditions,” Downs said. “But scientists typically rely on a time series of images to understand what’s happening. One of NISAR’s strengths is it observes the same areas twice every 12 days, producing a sequence of radar measurements that tells a full story.”

More about NISAR 

A joint mission developed by NASA and ISRO, NISAR was launched in July 2025 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre on India’s southeastern coast. Managed by Caltech, JPL leads the U.S. component of the project and provided the satellite’s L-band SAR, with a wavelength of 9 inches (24 centimeters), and antenna reflector. The spacecraft bus, the S-band SAR, which operates at a wavelength of 4 inches (10 centimeters), as well as the launch vehicle and launch services were provided by ISRO.

The NISAR satellite is the first to carry two SAR instruments at different wavelengths and monitors Earth’s land and ice surfaces twice every 12 days, collecting data using the spacecraft’s giant drum-shaped reflector, the largest radar antenna reflector NASA has ever sent into space. 

To learn more about NISAR, visit: 

https://science.nasa.gov/mission/nisar/

Media Contacts

Andrew Good / Andrew Wang
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-2433 / 626-379-6874
andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov / andrew.wang@jpl.nasa.gov

2026-019

Explore More

3 min read

Kona Storms Flood Oʻahu

Back-to-back subtropical cyclones in March fueled destructive flash flooding on several of the Hawaiian Islands.

Article 14 hours ago

2 min read

NASA Research Proposes Technology to Seek Earth-Like Exoplanets

Article 1 day ago

3 min read

Tropical Cyclone Narelle Crosses Australia

The powerful storm lashed the northern edge of the continent with damaging winds and drenching…

Article 2 days ago

Keep Exploring

Discover More Topics From NASA

NISAR

NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) systematically maps Earth, measuring changes of our planet’s surface as small as a centimeter.

Climate Change

NASA is a global leader in studying Earth’s changing climate.

NISAR and Water

A large percentage of the world’s population resides near the coasts and derives its livelihood from the coastal environment, and…

NISAR News & Updates

January 25, 2026

March 14, 2026

January 25, 2026March 14, 2026

January 25, 2026

March 14, 2026

January 25, 2026 – March 14, 2026

CurtainToggle2-Up

Image Details

Floodwaters pool in neighborhoods and on farmland, while a plume of sediment spreads into the coastal ocean (right) on March 14, 2026, after the first of two kona lows dropped copious rain on O’ahu, Hawaii. The same location is pictured free of floodwater (left) on January 25, 2026. Both images were acquired with the OLI (Operational Land Imager) on Landsat 9.

Back-to-back low-pressure systems struck Hawaii in March 2026, delivering some of the worst flooding the state has seen in decades. The subtropical weather systems—called kona lows near Hawaii—siphoned moisture from the tropics, fueling slow-moving thunderstorms with torrential, destructive rains.

The National Weather Service reported rainfall totals of 5 to 10 inches (13 to 26 centimeters) throughout the state between March 11 and 15, with some areas seeing more than 30 inches. Weather stations in Honolulu, Hilo, Līhuʻe, and Kahului all broke daily rainfall records.

The satellite image on the right shows swamped neighborhoods and farmland between Mokuleia and Waialua on the island of O’ahu on March 14, 2026, after the first and more destructive storm system hit the island. Plumes of suspended sediment have discolored waters in and around Kaiaka Bay. Hawaii’s volcanic Hilo soils are known for being red due to the high levels of iron and aluminum oxide that accumulate as they weather. For comparison, the image on the left shows the same area on January 25, 2026, before the deluge.

Preliminary assessments indicate that hundreds of homes in O’ahu sustained damage. Farmers on the island and across the state reported millions of dollars in damage, according to news reports. The storm produced widespread wind gusts between 60 and 75 miles (97 and 121 kilometers) per hour, with gusts in some places reaching 100 miles per hour. As many as 115,000 O’ahu residents faced power outages in the storm’s aftermath.

While the most intense rains had subsided by March 24, forecasters are continuing to monitor unsettled weather and the possibility of more flash floods in the coming days.

NASA’s Disasters Response Coordination System has been activated to support the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency’s response to the storms. The team will be posting maps and data products on its open-access mapping portal as new information becomes available.

NASA Earth Observatory images by Lauren Dauphin, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Story by Adam Voiland.

Downloads

January 25, 2026

JPEG (3.99 MB)

March 14, 2026

JPEG (3.18 MB)

References & Resources

• Associated Press (2026, March 24) Here’s what to know as the scope of damage from Hawaii’s floods becomes clearer. Accessed March 24, 2026.
• City and County of Honolulu (2026) Kona Low Storm Recovery. Accessed March 24, 2026.  
• County of Maui (2026) March Kona Storm Informational Page. Accessed March 24, 2026.  
• FEMA, via Esri (2026) Flooding: Hawaii. Accessed March 24, 2026.  
• Hawai‘i Emergency Management Agency (2026, March 16) March 2026 Kona Low. Accessed March 24, 2026.  
• Honolulu Civil Beat (2026, March 23) Mud, Mud And More Mud: Residents Of Oʻahu’s North Shore Start To Dig Out. Accessed March 24, 2026.
• NASA (2026) Disasters Mapping Portal. Accessed March 24, 2026.
• NASA Earthdata (2025) Floods Learning Resources. Accessed March 24, 2026.
• National Weather Service (2026, March 16) Rainfall and wind summaries from March 10-16. Accessed March 24, 2026.
• National Weather Service (2026, March 16) State Forecast. Accessed March 24, 2026.
• USA Today (2026, March 24) Wild scenes from Hawaii’s worst flooding in 20 years. Accessed March 24, 2026.

You may also be interested in:

Stay up-to-date with the latest content from NASA as we explore the universe and discover more about our home planet.

A Winter Blanket Covers North Carolina

3 min read

In late January 2026, a strong, moisture-laden storm dropped snow across nearly the entire state, spanning from the Appalachians to…

Article

Wave of Dust Rolls Through Texas

3 min read

An advancing cold front kicked up a sharp line of sand and other small particles that swept over the high…

Article

Snow Buries the U.S. Interior and East

2 min read

Satellites observed a frozen landscape across much of the country after a massive winter storm.

Article

Keep Exploring

Discover More from NASA Earth Science

Subscribe to Earth Observatory Newsletters

Subscribe to the Earth Observatory and get the Earth in your inbox.

Earth Observatory Image of the Day

NASA’s Earth Observatory brings you the Earth, every day, with in-depth stories and stunning imagery.

Explore Earth Science

Earth Science Data

Open access to NASA’s archive of Earth science data