Hurricane Lee looks absolutely terrifying in this footage from inside its eye (video)

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You definitely don't want to be this close to Lee.

Storm chasers caught terrifying footage from inside the eye of Hurricane Lee on Friday (Sept. 8).

The footage of the hurricane shows lightning crackling throughout the storm as its jet-black eye looms ominously overhead. The video was shot by the U.S. Air Force Reserve's 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron in Biloxi, Mississippi, known as the "Hurricane Hunters." The video was published by the U.S. Department of Defense on Friday (song "Broken Glass" by Logan Spaleta added by Space.com).

Hurricane Lee is currently a Category 4 storm, meaning it features sustained winds of 130 to 156 mph (209 to 251 kph). As of Friday, the storm is in the Atlantic Ocean east of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and is expected to move north over the next several days. It's not yet known if the storm will have any impacts on the U.S. Atlantic coast, according to a statement from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Hurricane Center. 

Related: Powerful Hurricane Jova spotted from space (video)

Lightning inside the eye of Hurricane Lee on Sept. 8 while the storm was over the Atlantic Ocean. (Image credit: U.S. Air Force video by Lt. Col. Mark Withee)

The rare look directly into the eye of a hurricane was made possible by the Hurricane Hunters. According to an Air Force fact sheet, the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron is the "only operational unit in the world flying weather reconnaissance on a routine basis."

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To get these incredible views from the inside of storms, the squadron flies specialized WC-130J Hercules aircraft. These are equipped with specialized meteorological sensors including dropsondes, instruments that are dropped directly through storms in order to create a top-to-bottom profile of wind, temperature and pressure. The aircraft can stay in the air for nearly 18 hours, allowing crews to collect weather data over extended periods.

Lee is the fourth hurricane and 13th named storm overall of the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season. In late August 2023, Hurricane Idalia made landfall along the United States' Gulf Coast, causing widespread damage throughout Northern Florida and Georgia's southwest. At least seven fatalities were attributed to the storm.

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Brett Tingley
Brett Tingley
Managing Editor, Space.com

Brett is curious about emerging aerospace technologies, alternative launch concepts, military space developments and uncrewed aircraft systems. Brett's work has appeared on Scientific American, The War Zone, Popular Science, the History Channel, Science Discovery and more. Brett has English degrees from Clemson University and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. In his free time, Brett enjoys skywatching throughout the dark skies of the Appalachian mountains.

6 Comments Comment from the forums
  • billslugg
    This is during the day time. An auto iris makes it look like night. Wait for it to relax and the sky will be blue. Right in the center is Venus.
    Reply
  • Osbert
    Admin said:
    Storm chasers with the Air Force Reserve's Hurricane Hunters caught terrifying footage from inside the eye of Hurricane Lee on Sept. 8, showing the storm brimming with lightning.

    Hurricane Lee looks absolutely terrifying in this footage from inside its eye (video) : Read more
    Could have done without the lame music/lyrics.
    I hardly find lightening to be TERRIFYING !!
    No way the OP is science related - GROW UP !!
    Oh so scary !!! lame
    Reply
  • Unclear Engineer
    The title is definitely "click bait".

    Watching the video, the frequency of the lightning was no more and maybe a little less than I witnessed in an unusual thunderstorm over the Delmarva Peninsula a couple of months ago. It was remarkable, and I checked weather reports to see if it contained a tornado, but it did not. A month before that, a smaller, less intense thunderstorm over roughly the same area contained an F3 tornado that killed a woman in her farmhouse.

    Certainly, the eye wall of any category hurricane is an extreme environment, not to be taken lightly. But "hurricane hunter" aircraft and crew do not take them lightly - they are prepared and professional. To imply that this was a terrifying event for them is not appropriate.
    Reply
  • cecilia
    Osbert said:
    Could have done without the lame music/lyrics.
    I hardly find lightening to be TERRIFYING !!
    No way the OP is science related - GROW UP !!
    Oh so scary !!! lame
    awww, show me on the doll where the music bed hurt you......:rolleyes:
    Reply
  • billslugg
    It's an annoying pain, right here, in the posterior region. Just one more example of irrelevant candy coating in the media. A subset of deceit, which has caught the favor of our society and will lead to its collapse around our grandchildren, reverting them to the stone age as they angrily destroy all traces of our existence. Other than that, I feel great.
    Reply
  • cecilia
    billslugg said:
    It's an annoying pain, right here, in the posterior region. Just one more example of irrelevant candy coating in the media. A subset of deceit, which has caught the favor of our society and will lead to its collapse around our grandchildren, reverting them to the stone age as they angrily destroy all traces of our existence. Other than that, I feel great.
    gee, I had no idea that simply observing a video of a storm would herald the end of civilization.

    frankly, if such activity is so painful maybe don't bother reading this web site.
    Reply