Between morning and afternoon, fires across Portugal and Spain appeared to flare up, producing much more smoke at the time of this image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Aqua satellite than during the earlier Terra MODIS image also acquired on August 4, 2003. Portugal has declared a national disaster due to the fires, which have been burning over a week and have killed 14 people.
The high-resolution image provided above is 500 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at MODIS’ maximum spatial resolution of 250 meters.
Image courtesy Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC
