The symmetrical cone of Kanaga volcano stands out on the northern corner of Kanaga Island, located in the central part of Alaska’s Aleutian archipelago. Kanaga last erupted in 1994 and is well known for its active fumaroles and hot springs (located, in this image, by fine steam plumes on the northeast flank of the volcano). A small lake to the southeast of the cone is situated on the floor of a larger more ancient volcanic caldera. The crew of the international space station acquired this image late in the day of August 13, 2002. Note how the late summer sun accentuates the terrain features like the volcanic flows that radiate down from the volcano’s peak, and the steep cliffs along the western coastline.
Published Sep 15, 2002Agriculture and the petroleum industry compete for land use near Denver City, Texas, southwest of Lubbock near the New Mexico border. The economy of this region is almost completely dependent on its underground resources of petroleum and water. Both resources result in distinctive land use patterns visible from space. Historically this area has produced vast quantities of oil and gas since development began in the 1930s. Note the fine, light-colored grid of roads and pipelines connecting well sites over this portion of the Wasson Oil Field, one of the state’s most productive. Since the 1940s, agricultural land use has shifted from grazing to irrigated cultivation of cotton, sorghum, wheat, hay, and corn. The water supply is drawn from wells tapping the vast, but failing, Ogallala Aquifer. Note the large, circular center-pivot irrigation systems in the lower corners of the image. The largest is nearly a mile in diameter.
Published Sep 8, 2002These images showing some of the devastating European flooding around the Danube Bend area just north of Budapest near the city of Vác, Hungary.
Published Aug 31, 2002This digital photograph taken through the windows of the International Space Station on May 15, 2002, shows condensation trails over the Rhône Valley in the region west of Lyon. Condensation trails—or contrails—are straight lines of ice crystals that form in the wake of jet liners where air temperatures at altitude are lower than about 40°C. Newer contrails are thin whereas older trails have widened with time as a result of light winds. Because of this tendency for thin contrails to cover greater areas with time, it is estimated that these “artificial clouds” cover 0.1% of the planet”s surface. Percentages are far higher in some places such as southern California, the Ohio River Valley and parts of Europe, as illustrated here.
Published Aug 18, 2002La Cumbre volcano on Fernandina Island is the most active volcano on the Galapagos, erupting most recently in 1995. The volcano rises 1495 m from sea level. This photo was taken by the Expedition 5 crew aboard the International Space Station. The scene provides a detailed view of the 850-m-deep summit caldera. The dark flows in the middle of the caldera floor were erupted in 1991. Today, these flows are partly covered by dark green vegetation.
Published Aug 11, 2002Fire scars and smoke plumes result from biomass burning in the savannas of southern Democratic Republic of Congo. Astronauts aboard the International Space Station observed the seasonal increase in savanna burning, which traditionally peaks in June in southern Democratic Republic of Congo.
Published Jul 30, 2002Mauna Loa is the largest volcano on our planet—the summit elevation is 4,170 m (over 13,600 ft), but the volcano’s summit rises 9 km above the sea floor. The sharp features of the summit caldera and lava flows that drain outward from the summit are tribute to the fact that Mauna Loa is one of the Earth’s most active volcanoes. The most recent eruption was in 1984. The straight line the cuts through the center of the crater from top to bottom is a rift zone—an area that pulls apart as magma reaches the surface.
Published Jul 28, 2002The red and green colors of the salt ponds in South San Francisco Bay are brilliant visual markers for astronauts. The STS-111 crew photographed the bay south of the San Mateo bridge in June, 2002.
Published Jul 21, 2002his cloudless view of northwestern Washington and southeastern British Columbia is a study in varied land-use patterns: the forested Olympic Peninsula and Cascade Range contrast with the wheatlands of the drier east side of the mountains. The checkerboard pattern of clearcut forest is accented by snow in the range east of Seattle. Major cities and seaports of the Pacific Northwest—Seattle, Tacoma and Vancouver—take advantage of the deep, sheltered channels.
Published Jun 30, 2002Although this photograph may appear to be a small pit mine as seen from the air, it is actually a pit mine that is about a mile wide and just over a thousand feet deep as photographed by astronauts orbiting the Earth on board the International Space Station. The New Cornelia Mine is located just south of Ajo, Arizona. Small-scale mining of copper in this area began with the Spaniards and Mexicans as early as 1750. This large-scale, systematic operation began in 1912 and expanded rapidly for the next 50 years. Since the mid 1980s, activity has been limited because of low prices for copper on the world market. Note the tailings deposits to the east (right) and the larger containment ponds for extraction processes to the northeast.
Published Jun 23, 2002This photograph taken by the new International Space Station crew on June 18, 2002, shows the eastern flank of the Hayman Fire burning in the foothills southwest of Denver.
Published Jun 21, 2002This photograph taken by the new International Space Station crew on June 18, 2002, shows the Hayman Fire burning in the foothills southwest of Denver.
Published Jun 20, 2002Forests are being harvested near Tokoroa, New Zealand, which has been described as the hub of New Zealand’s forestry industry. The large tan areas are cleared forests. The land use pattern that looks like tan beads on a string are clearings used to stock timber before it is sent to pulp and paper mills about 4 kilometers south of Tokoroa. The light green areas around the town are dairy farms.
Published Jun 16, 2002This photograph taken from the International Space Station on June 7, 2002, shows the Wolf and Copper Fires burning in the hills outside Los Angeles.
Published Jun 15, 2002This photograph taken from the International Space Station on June 7, 2002, shows the Copper Fire burning in the hills outside Los Angeles.
Published Jun 15, 2002Airborne African dust regularly reaches northeastern South America and the Caribbean. Westward dust transport from the Sahara across the central Atlantic has been a common occurrence this spring, with major events visible in both satellite images and photographs. Cap Vert, the westernmost point of Senegal, is dimly visible beneath the dust mass (center); the Arquipélago dos Bijagós in Guinea Bissau lies opposite the mouth of the sediment-laden Rio Corubal.
Published Jun 9, 2002This image of the Bullock Fire was taken by the crew of the International Space Station using a digital camera on May 23, 2002, two days after the fire began. By May 25, fighting the fire was listed as the top national priority.
Published Jun 4, 2002The lush forests of Egmont National Park, on New Zealand‘s North Island, contrast with the pasturelands outside the circular park boundaries. The unique shape of the park results from its first protection in 1881, which specified that a forest reserve would extend in a 9.6-kilometer radius from the summit of Mt. Taranaki (named Mt. Egmont by Captain Cook). The park covers about 33,500 hectares and Mt. Egmont stands 2518 meters tall. The volcano began forming 70,000 years ago, and last erupted in 1755. A series of montane habitats occur in procession up the flanks of the volcano—from rainforest, to shrubs, to alpine, and finally snow cover.
Published Jun 2, 2002Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) took this photograph of the San Francisco Bay area in April, 2002. The gray urban footprint of San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and their surrounding suburbs contrast strongly with the green hillsides. Of particular note are the Pacific Ocean water patterns that are highlighted in the sun glint. Sets of internal waves traveling east impinge on the coastline south of San Francisco. At the same time, fresher bay water flows out from the bay beneath the Golden Gate Bridge, creating a large plume traveling westward. Tidal current channels suggest the tidal flow deep in thebay. Because the ISS orbits are not synchronous with the sun, astronauts view the Earth with variable solar illumination angles. This allows them to document phenomena such as the sun reflecting differentially off surface waters in a way that outlines complicated water structures.
Published May 26, 2002This photograph, acquired in February 1984 by an astronaut aboard the space shuttle, shows a series of mature thunderstorms located near the Paraná River in southern Brazil. With abundant warm temperatures and moisture-laden air in this part of Brazil, large thunderstorms are commonplace. A NASA-funded researcher has discovered that tiny airborne particles of pollution may modify developing thunderclouds by increasing the quantity and reducing the size of the ice crystals within them. These modifications may affect the clouds’ impact on the Earth’s “radiation budget,” or the amount of radiation that enters and leaves our planet.
Published May 15, 2002The bright blue water of the Gulf of Honduras contrasts sharply with the smokey pall over Guatemala and Belize in this photograph taken from the International Space Station. Fires in the Yucatan Penninsula and northern Central America began burning in early April, and intensified by the end of the month.
Published May 14, 2002The colors of the agricultural fields surrounding Paris are striking in thespringtime, even when viewed from a 400-kilometer orbital altitude, as seen in this photography taken by astronauts on board the International Space Station.
Published May 12, 2002Astronaut photography of the Earth from the International Space Station has achieved resolutions close to those available from commercial remote sensing satellites—with many photographs having spatial resolutions of less than six meters. Astronauts take the photographs by hand and physically compensate for the motion of the spacecraft relative to the Earth while the images are being acquired.
Published May 6, 2002This detailed image of Everest, the highest (29,035 feet, 8850 meters) mountain in the world, shows early morning light on the eastern Kangshung Face. The mountains appear to jump out of the picture because the image was taken with low sunlight using an electronic still camera equipped with an 800 mm lens.
Published Apr 28, 2002Coastal fog commonly drapes the Peruvian coast. This image captures complex interactions between land, sea, and atmosphere along the southern Peruvian coast. When Shuttle astronauts took the image in March 2002, the layers of coastal fog and stratus were being progressively scoured away by brisk south to southeast winds.
Published Apr 21, 2002A dengue fever outbreak has plagued Rio de Janeiro since January 2002. Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne disease. The elimination of standing water, which is a breeding ground for the mosquitoes, is a primary defense against mosquito-borne diseases like dengue. Removing such water remains a difficult problem in many urban regions.
Published Apr 14, 2002International Space Station crew members are regularly alerted to dynamic events on the Earth’s surface. On request from scientists on the ground, the ISS crew observed and recorded volcanic activity from the summit of Soufriere Hills on March 20, 2002.
Published Apr 7, 2002The San Quintín Glacier is the largest outflow glacier of the Northern Patagonian Ice Field in southern Chile. Like many glaciers worldwide during the twentieth century, San Quintín appears to be losing mass and possibly retreating.
Published Mar 31, 2002An Earth Observatory reader used widely available software to correct the oblique perspective of an earlier photograph of Montserrat and to adjust the color. The story of how he modified the image includes step-by-step instructions that can be applied to other photographs.
Published Mar 27, 2002Pronounced “Ki-ris-mas,” Kiritimati Island has a large in-filled lagoon that gives it the largest land area (125 square miles, 321 square kilometers) of any atoll in the world. Captain Cook named the atoll Christmas Island when he arrived on Christmas Eve in 1777. Used for nuclear testing in the 1950s and 1960s, the island is now valued for its marine and wildlife resources. It is particularly important as a seabird nesting site—with an estimated 6 million birds using or breeding on the island, including several million Sooty Terns. Rainfall on Kiritimati is linked to El Ni&ntidle;o patterns, with long droughts experienced between the wetter El Ni&ntidle;o years.
Published Mar 24, 2002