Eyes in the Sky

Satellites image fires, lava flows, and heatwaves in US and Europe

Here is a sampling of satellite images of recent events in the US and Europe:

** Fires in California: US weather satellites view wildfires in California: Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) 16 and 17: Monitoring storm systems and California’s wildfires | WHNT.com

More about satellite imaging of the US West Coast fires from space at NASA Satellite Sees Fires Up and Down U.S. West Coast | NASA.

** Volcano lava flows in Hawaii: NASA satellite captures lava destruction from Kilauea volcano – CNET

Lava from Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano flowing to the Pacific Ocean, imaged July 25 by NASA’s Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection (ASTER) instrument. Vegetation shown in red, clouds in white and lava in yellow. Credit: NASA/METI/AIST/Japan Space Systems/U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team
› Full image and caption

Another image from Satellite View of Kilauea Eruption – NASA JPL:

This image from NASA’s Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) instrument on NASA’s Terra spacecraft show recent eruptions of Kilauea volcano on the island of Hawaii (the Big Island). Following days of increased seismic activity, Kilauea erupted May 3, 2018, and triggered a number of additional fissure eruptions along the East Rift Zone. The eruptions and high level of sulfur dioxide gas (SO2) prompted evacuations in the area, including the Leilani Estates subdivision near the town of Pahoa. The ASTER images, acquired on May 6, 2018, show different aspects of the eruption. A color composite depicts vegetation in red, and old lava flows in black and gray. Superimposed on the image in yellow are hotspots detected on the thermal infrared bands. The easternmost hot spots show the newly formed fissures and the lava flow spilling to the northwest. Continue...

** Fires in Greece: DigitalGlobe shows images of the sites in Greece where wildfires hit suddenly.

This article includes side by side views with sliders to compare before and after the fires: Satellite images show the intensity of the flames that devastated coastal Greece — Quartz

** Europe’s summer heatwave:

As this year’s heatwave continues, the Copernicus Sentinel-3 mission reveals once again how the colour of our vegetation has changed in just one month. These two images cover the same area: part of Ireland, the UK, the Netherlands, Belgium, part of Germany and part of France, but the difference between them couldn’t be more striking. The first, captured on 28 June 2018, is predominantly green, depicting healthy vegetation. The second, captured on 25 July 2018, however, is mainly brown, showing just how much the vegetation has changed owing to the long hot dry spell Europe has been enduring over the last weeks.

These two images were captured by Sentinel-3’s ocean and land colour instrument. See also similar captures over Germany, Denmark and Sweden: European drought.

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