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Sea Surface Temperature Anomaly

Sea surface temperature refers to the temperature of the top millimeter of the ocean. An anomaly is a departure from average conditions. These maps compare temperatures in a given month to the long-term average temperature of that month from 1985 through 1997. Blue shows temperatures that were cooler than average, white shows near-average temperatures, and red shows where temperatures were warmer than average. Regions for which no data were available are gray. The maps are made from data collected by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer-EOS (AMSR-E) compared to historical data collected by a series of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellites.

Fire

The fire maps show the locations of actively burning fires around the world on a monthly basis, based on observations from the MODIS sensors on NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites. The colors are based on a count of the number (not size) of fires observed within a 1,000-square-kilometer area. White pixels show the high end of the count — as many as 100 fires in a 1,000-square-kilometer area per day. Yellow pixels show as many as 10 fires, orange shows as many as 5 fires, and red areas as few as 1 fire per day.

View, download, or analyze more of these data from NASA Earth Observations (NEO):

Sea Surface Temperature Anomaly

Fire