Fires and Deforestation in Brazil

Fires and Deforestation in Brazil

In southern Brazil, skies were thick with the smoke from scores of fires (red dots) when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite passed over on September 30, 2002. Fires extend over a large area of central South America, and news reports suggest they are particularly bad this year due to a hot, windy winter.

Image by Jesse Allen, based on data from the MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA-GSFC