Hurricane Laura is a disaster. The storm came ashore Wednesday night as a Category 4 hurricane, killing at least one person. Residents of Texas and Louisiana who are unable to evacuate have been hit hard. But as the storm makes its way inland from the Gulf of Mexico, people are watching their progress up close. Microsoft Flight Simulator.
Flight Simulator includes a live weather system, which models Laura at the base of the gaming world. Microsoft has partnered with Swiss meteorological service Meteoblue, dividing the game’s world into 2 million blocks of 100 square kilometers, each with its own simulated weather system based on real world data. The result is something very remarkable.
Simply put, Hurricane Laura’s movies Microsoft Flight Simulator is both frightening and awful. It is also much safer than traditional forms of observing these types of intense storms first hand.
Microsoft Flight Simulator draws in a lot of real world data, which sometimes leads to hiccups and glitches as the game struggles to bring it all together as a cohesive whole. Water data, however, are an exception. The game does not put individual clouds in the game where they are in the real sky, but instead a refined simulation based on the data. The result: incredibly beautiful photos of a virtual version of the same storm.
This thread by Alex, a Twitter user and video editor, shows more breathtaking footage of Hurricane Laura from a distance. It’s worth reading the whole thread to see his entire image gallery, including one taken from such a high angle that his plane had to be designed.
Alex also noted that he was not alone. Flight Simulator also pulls in real-world live flight data. While there were no other real flights in the area of the storm, there were plenty of other players in-game who explored the hurricane with him.
AFAIK all green dots are other players.
I feel that MS Flight Sim will create a new genre of gaming events where people detect IRL weather events in the game in order to experience them.
It’s so amazing that this stuff is possible. pic.twitter.com/ZBws2qFIbc
– Technical Alex ✊ ️ (@TechnicalDIY) August 27, 2020
Of course, you should not use a speed simulator – like a game of any kind – to control dangerous storms like these when they hit you. It is possible to monitor Hurricane Laura’s progress through the National Hurricane Center’s website, which shows a map, relevant statistics and safety information.
