NOAA Sea to Sky: Education resource database

Shocking! Within this cluster of storms, a single lightning bolt captured by NOAA satellites was recently certified by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) as the world’s longest flash on record. The horizontal distance of the bolt stretched 477 miles, from the central coast of Texas to southern Mississippi, when it flashed on April 29, 2020.

This dataset shows the paths of the 2023 and 2024 eclipses and the percentage of the sun in the eclipse that will occur. The paths are layers that can be turned on and off. To add some language arts themes, try out these associated poetry activities, some of which are available in Spanish. 

The 6+ miles wide asteroid that hit Earth 66 million years ago, widely accepted to have wiped out nearly all the dinosaurs and roughly three-quarters of the planet’s plant and animal species, also triggered a megatsunami with mile-high waves. Recent historical tsunamis pale in comparison with this globally catastrophic event, thought to be 30,000 times more initial energy than any recorded events. Watch this visualization of this tsunami as it spans the entire ocean.

Explore this interactive map of global tsunamis and their sources. By clicking on any tsunami event, you can access more information, including an overview of the tsunami, more information about the source, and the number of deaths. Get started with a helpful teacher guide.

This data animation shows atmospheric carbon dioxide from 1979 through 2021. Following that time series, the animation compares the levels to preindustrial levels and the ice ages. The animation is downloadable.

Estuaries act as water filters between the land and the ocean. This animation helps us understand how estuaries effectively filter water through areas.

Why teach about estuaries? This suite of estuary education resources help educators bring estuarine science into the classroom through hands-on learning, experiments, fieldwork, and data explorations. These specially designed lessons, activities, data explorations, animations and videos can be used independently or as a supplement to existing curricula and can be adapted to meet any grade level.

Explore a GOES-R https://scijinks.gov/goes-r/ series satellite with this interactive 3D model, which allows you to move the satellite around and discover all its working parts on a desktop or mobile device screen. Especially great for the hardcore weather nerds!

Each year, numerous whales and other marine animals are entangled in fishing gear. Because it often wraps around these creatures -- and unlike us, marine creatures lack opposable thumbs to free themselves -- this debris can hurt or even kill whales, turtles, and other animals through starvation, strangulation and drowning. NOAA's Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and our partners work hard to disentangle these creatures and set them free.

It is no secret that the Northwest United States receives copious amounts of rain all year long. From San Francisco to Seattle, cloudy skies and rain are common weather patterns. One reason for this constant stream of precipitation are rivers in the atmosphere that transport moisture from Central and Western Pacific, resulting in precipitation in the U.S. These rivers are part of the cycling of water around the planet, and can also be found in the Atlantic and Indian Ocean basins. This animation shows the atmospheric rivers using a variety of data from visible and infrared satellites, to special satellite sensors that can detect microwave energy to visualize the river plumes, and even RADAR to measure the amount of precipitation released from the rivers.