Earth Matters

November Puzzler

November 27th, 2018 by Kathryn Hansen

Every month on Earth Matters, we offer a puzzling satellite image. The November 2018 puzzler is above. Your challenge is to use the comments section to tell us what we are looking at and why it is interesting.

How to answer. You can use a few words or several paragraphs. You might simply tell us the location. Or you can dig deeper and explain what satellite and instrument produced the image, what spectral bands were used to create it, or what is compelling about some obscure feature in the image. If you think something is interesting or noteworthy, tell us about it.

The prize. We can’t offer prize money or a trip to Mars, but we can promise you credit and glory. Well, maybe just credit. Roughly one week after a puzzler image appears on this blog, we will post an annotated and captioned version as our Image of the Day. After we post the answer, we will acknowledge the first person to correctly identify the image at the bottom of this blog post. We also may recognize readers who offer the most interesting tidbits of information about the geological, meteorological, or human processes that have shaped the landscape. Please include your preferred name or alias with your comment. If you work for or attend an institution that you would like to recognize, please mention that as well.

Recent winners. If you’ve won the puzzler in the past few months or if you work in geospatial imaging, please hold your answer for at least a day to give less experienced readers a chance to play.

Releasing Comments. Savvy readers have solved some puzzlers after a few minutes. To give more people a chance to play, we may wait between 24 to 48 hours before posting comments.

Good luck!

13 Responses to “November Puzzler”

  1. Sseziwa Mukasa says:

    Sannikov Strait

  2. Susan says:

    I think it is a glacier that is melting on the end (at the top of the pic) connected to a lake (blue circle on the right). The gray areas are land masses and the white lines in the gray are snow-covered mountaintops.

  3. M says:

    it appears to an Antarctic ice flow with barren riverine/glacial topography.
    But where on the coast?

  4. Ajay Kunnath says:

    This looks like Arctic shipping routes

  5. Ryan Masse says:

    It’s a frozen part of (what I’m guessing is) the Laptev Sea between the western side of Kotelny Island and the eastern side of Belkovsky Island, which are both parts of the New Siberian Islands north of mainland Siberia.

  6. Jim Plaxco says:

    Icy arctic waters in the Zarya Strait with Kotelny Island on the right and Belkovsky Island at left – both part of the New Siberian Islands group.

  7. Larry Little says:

    Glacial flows and lakes in Greenland.

  8. joanna hodge says:

    Ice that is breaking up in water in an area surrounded by mountains. Possibly an area of sea ice or the calving zone of a glacier. Antarctica?

  9. Gerhard says:

    Ice break in June in the sea strait between Kotelny island and Belkovsky island. These islands belong to the Lyakhov Islands – north of the Siberian mainland. The Sanikov strait in the south of the archipelago is part of the northeast passage, which is expected to become increasingly viable for transit shipping for longer periods. (Image of the day for November 23, 2018)

  10. RK says:

    This is the frozen Proliv Zarya strait, off the north coast of Siberia. Belkovsky Island on the left, Kotelny Island on the right. Uninhabited tundra islands apart from an air base on Kotelny.

  11. ivan kordac says:

    It looks like couple days before Image of the day polar sea ice on north polar ocean by Siberia … 🙂

  12. Γιάννης Μητράκας says:

    The iced sea between the Kotelny island (left) and the Belkovsky island (right).
    75.22’43” N, 136.31’52” E

  13. Art Caffrey says:

    Recent flooding in north Saudi Arabia?