Astronaut Ricky Arnold, who is currently aboard NASA’s International Space Station, shared the snaps of Florence on Thursday as it swirled over the Atlantic.
He tweeted: “#HurricaneFlorence strengthens in the early morning hours over the Atlantic.”
Florence is a tropical storm at present but the US National Hurricane Centre (NHC) warned “restrengthening [was] expected over the weekend”.
Maximum sustained winds were 65mph, according to NHC’s most recent update at 4pm BST (11am AST).
Category one hurricanes must have a minimum wind speed of 74mph.
*The tropical storm was located about 935 miles east-south-east of Bermuda and is expected to head west at 8mph over the weekend.
A second image, taken from NASA’s Aqua satellite, today showed Florence’s slight weakening due to warmer cloud top temperature caused by wind shear.
The infrared picture was taken at 10am BST today.
Wind shear, which is the speed and direction of the wind in the atmosphere over a short distance, has a huge effect on the formation of hurricanes.
When wind shear is high, this stops tropical storms building into greater strength.
Edward Pritchard from NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory said: “The most favorable condition for tropical cyclone development is the absence of wind shear.
“When wind shear is present, however, a storm’s core structure becomes vertically tilted in relationship to the wind shear, disrupting the flow of heat and moisture.
Florence’s “strong southwesterly [wind] shear” will begin to lessen this weekend, according to NHC.
NHC forecaster Zelinksy said: “Florence’s structure continues to be negatively affected by strong southwesterly [wind] shear.
“Cloud tops have generally warmed over the past 6 hours, and recent microwave data show that the low-level circulation center of Florence is displaced nearly 20 nautical miles to the southwest of the mid-level center.”
Will Florence hit the US East Coast?
NHC has said “life-threatening surf and rip current conditions” will hit Bermuda today “and reach portions of the US East Coast over the weekend”.
It is is too uncertain to know whether Florence will make landfall yet.
But some weather forecasters are predicting the likelihood is increasing.
Meteorological Scientist Michael Ventricle tweeted today: “Still a wide array of possibilities for #Florence with higher risk compared to yesterday for a landfall somewhere across the Southeastern states this AM.
“There are still members not landfalling however. Still monitoring.”