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Year: 2015

Posted on by Tassia Owen Posted in News and Events
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NASA Earth Observatory map by Joshua Stevens and Jesse Allen, using data from the Global Fire Assimilation System (GFAS) and the State of the Climate in 2014 report. Caption by Adam Voiland.

On Earth, there is always something burning. On a typical day in August, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometers (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua and Terra satellites detect approximately 10,000 active fires, as well as huge swaths of freshly charred land in ecosystems ranging from boreal forests to savanna to tropical forests.

In order to determine how much carbon dioxide and other pollutants all these fires contribute to the atmosphere in a given year, scientists have developed computer models that combine satellite observations of burned area and active fires together with information about vegetation, fuel loads, and other details. Data produced by two computer modeling efforts—the Global Fire Assimilation System (GFAS) and the Global Fire Emissions Database (GFED)—were highlighted in NOAA’s 2014 State of the Climate report, published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. Read more

Posted on by Tassia Owen Posted in News and Events
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NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen, using data from NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS, and U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team. Caption by Kathryn Hansen.

Crete is the largest and most populous Greek island, spanning 8,300 square kilometers (3,200 square miles) and supporting a population of 620,000. A short distance northwest of Crete is a lesser-known Greek island, Antikythera. The island is comparatively tiny, spanning just 20 square kilometers (8 square miles) and supporting a human population that hovers around 50.

This view of Antikythera was acquired on September 23, 2013, by the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on the Terra satellite. The landscape is typical of a small Mediterranean island, consisting primarily of open countryside and low shrubs. Steep, limestone cliffs line most of the island; flatter expanses of beach are more common on Kythira, a larger Greek island to the north. Read more

Posted on by Tassia Owen Posted in News and Events
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NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen, using data provided by John Yorks and Matthew McGill of the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) team. Caption by Kathryn Hansen.

Cirrus—the wispy, icy clouds that form high in the atmosphere—are known to have a net warming effect on the climate. But how much? The question is hard to answer because even among cirrus clouds, there is wide variety and complexity in their structure.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite acquired a natural-color view of clouds over the South Pacific on April 2, 2015. Cirrus are the thinner clouds appearing to spread out from points across the center of the image.

The red line on the MODIS image shows the area scanned just hours before by the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) onboard the International Space Station. “The space station orbit provides comprehensive coverage of the tropical and mid-latitude regions, where cirrus clouds are most prevalent,” said John Yorks, science lead of the CATS team at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. Read more

Posted on by Tassia Owen Posted in News and Events

For two weeks in late June and early July 2015, western Europe and the Pacific Northwest of North America endured record-setting heat and parched landscapes. Other parts of the world got a taste of the heat, too, as new temperature records were set on three continents.

The map above shows daytime land surface temperature anomalies in Europe from June 30 to July 9, 2015. Temperatures for those ten days are compared to the 2001–2010 average for the same period. Shades of red depict areas where the land surface was hotter than the long-term average; areas in blue were below average. White pixels were normal, and gray pixels did not have enough data, most likely due to excessive cloud cover.

This temperature anomaly map is based on data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite. Observed by satellites uniformly around the world, land surface temperatures (LSTs) are not the same as air temperatures. LSTs reflect the heating of the land by sunlight, and they can sometimes be significantly hotter or cooler than air temperatures. Read more

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NASA Earth Observatory images created by Jesse Allen, using Land Surface Data from the MODIS Science Team. Caption by Michael Carlowicz.

Posted on by Tassia Owen Posted in News and Events
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NASA images by Jeff Schmaltz, LANCE/EOSDIS Rapid Response. Caption by Mike Carlowicz.

A difficult fire season in western Canada brought its impacts to coastal city streets in early July 2015. A thick pall of smoke settled over Vancouver and adjacent areas of British Columbia, leading some residents to wear face masks and health officials to warn residents and World Cup tourists against outdoor activities.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite acquired these images in the late morning on July 5 and 6. Note how the tan and gray smoke almost completely obscures the Strait of Georgia and southern Vancouver Island. Winds shifted abruptly between July 5 and 6, driving the smoke plume toward the east, dispersing it in some places while fouling the air in areas to the east, such as the Fraser Valley. Read more