Images
August 4, 2010 - Fires and smoke in eastern Siberia
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Numerous large forest fires were burning in Russia’s Far East on July 19, 2010, when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite passed overhead and captured this photo-like image. Actively burning areas that MODIS detected are outlined in red, while thick smoke shrouds the forested landscape below. The body of water at lower left is a bay at the northeastern end of the Sea of Okhotsk.
Clusters of red outlines indicate areas with unusually high surface temperatures, each associated with actively burning fires. Most of the fires send their plumes to the southwest, but others blow to the northeast and northwest, indicating the variable wind direction in the region. A thick plume of intensely gray smoke, measuring hundreds of kilometers wide, can be seen stretching across the Bering Sea, completely obscuring the water in some areas.
In the lower center of the image lies the Kamchatka peninsula. A triangle of three hotspots, which do not appear to be associated with smoke, are located at the base of the Klyuchevsky volcano. This snow-covered volcano was reported to have experienced two eruptions in June, spewing jets of incandescent lava and ash clouds several hundred meters into the sky.
Image Facts
Satellite:
Terra
Date Acquired: 7/19/2010
Resolutions:
1km ( B), 500m ( B), 250m ( B)
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit:
Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
Numerous large forest fires were burning in Russia’s Far East on July 19, 2010, when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite passed overhead and captured this photo-like image. Actively burning areas that MODIS detected are outlined in red, while thick smoke shrouds the forested landscape below. The body of water at lower left is a bay at the northeastern end of the Sea of Okhotsk.
Clusters of red outlines indicate areas with unusually high surface temperatures, each associated with actively burning fires. Most of the fires send their plumes to the southwest, but others blow to the northeast and northwest, indicating the variable wind direction in the region. A thick plume of intensely gray smoke, measuring hundreds of kilometers wide, can be seen stretching across the Bering Sea, completely obscuring the water in some areas.
In the lower center of the image lies the Kamchatka peninsula. A triangle of three hotspots, which do not appear to be associated with smoke, are located at the base of the Klyuchevsky volcano. This snow-covered volcano was reported to have experienced two eruptions in June, spewing jets of incandescent lava and ash clouds several hundred meters into the sky.
Image Facts
Satellite:
Terra
Date Acquired: 7/19/2010
Resolutions:
1km ( B), 500m ( B), 250m ( B)
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit:
Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
