Landsat's Critical Role in Responding to Natural Disasters
In 2011, natural disasters affected 206 million people worldwide, costing a record-setting 355 billion dollars. Fire, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, and other natural disasters can be particularly tragic and costly when critical facilities such as power plants, airports, roads, and hospitals are threatened. When a disaster strikes, remote sensing is often the only way to get a big-picture view of what is happening on the ground. With its consistent, reliable, repeated observations of Earth’s changing surface, Landsat keeps a record of Earth’s land surfaces before and after disasters, serving as an essential tool for assessing risk, mapping the extent of damage, and planning post-disaster recovery. Landsat produces 185-kilometer-wide images with 30-meter resolution in visible and infrared wavelengths of light, making it possible to map impacts on the landscape in ways otherwise not visible to human sight. For example, Landsat sensors enable us to see the heat from fires both during and after the burns, and the lava flows from volcanic eruptions even when gaseous substances obscure the view to human eyes.
Arizona Wildfire Sweeps Through Apache National Forest
Source: Jan Nelson, USGS / Rob Gutro, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center The second largest fire in Arizona history, the Wallow Fire is graphically depicted by this Landsat image, taken
Landsat 5 Sees Tornado Track near Sturbridge, Massachusetts
Source: Michon Scott, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center On June 1, 2011, a supercell thunderstorm developed over western Massachusetts. The storm produced an EF3 tornado that cut a 39-mile (63-kilometer)
Landsat Offers Stunning Comparison Of Flooding
Extreme rainfall and heavy snowmelt have combined this spring to bring the Mississippi River roaring beyond its banks. While humans on the ground have scrambled to evacuate, build sandbag walls,
Landsat Images Display Extreme Mississippi River Flooding
Recent Landsat satellite data captured by the USGS and NASA on May 10 shows the major flooding of the Mississippi River around Memphis, Tenn. and along the state borders of
Understanding Disaster Aftermath in Japan
Contributors: Laura Rocchio and Julia Barsi After the violent March 11 Tohoku earthquake and devastating Japanese tsunami, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) coordinated a volunteer GIS-based analysis effort as part
Landsat Reveal Surprising Connection Between Beetle Attacks, Wildfire
If your summer travels have taken you across the Rocky Mountains, you’ve probably seen large swaths of reddish trees dotting otherwise green forests. While it may look like autumn has
