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Pine Island Glacier is one of the fastest-retreating glaciers in Antarctica. This timeline highlights the most notable calving events of the past two decades.
Smoke from a large fire in northwest Mexico streamed east.
While the now silent Vanguard II continues to orbit the Earth, its back-up brother has been restored and mounted in the Goddard Space Flight Center’s Earth Sciences building’s atrium.
Published Apr 23, 2019 in Earth Matters
The Madre de Dios region has a rich concentration of endemic species, but their habitats are being threatened by human activity.
Published Apr 18, 2019
NASA studies Earth as part of its mission. We invite you to celebrate the planet in the #PictureEarth social media event.
Published Apr 18, 2019 in Earth Matters
EO Kids is seeing green! Can people really change the color of our planet? Find out how Earth is greening up from forests and farms and how NASA can see our greener Earth from space.
Published Apr 17, 2019 in EO Kids
Persistent drought and intensive water use has proven too much for this lake in Chile.
Published Apr 17, 2019
If we travel two decades back in time and rewind the 4.73 billion kilometers that the satellite has flown since April 1999, we arrive at a very different moment in spaced-based Earth observation.
Published Apr 16, 2019 in Earth Matters
The break up of lake ice in springtime unveils the turquoise waters of one of Asia’s largest lakes.
Published Apr 16, 2019
South Dakota was one of the hardest hit states.
Published Apr 15, 2019
High altitudes in the Andes beget salt flats and rain shadows along the border of Chile and Bolivia.
Published Apr 12, 2019
Spaceborne laser observations show fine details of forests and land topography.
Published Apr 12, 2019
Snow and ice influences climate by reflecting sunlight back into space. When it melts, snow is a source of water for drinking and vegetation; too much snowmelt can lead to floods. These maps show average snow cover by month.
12 months of high-resolution global true color satellite imagery.
Published Oct 13, 2005
Wildfires and agricultural burning have produced thick haze for the past month.
Published Apr 12, 2019
Powerful winds lofted massive amounts of dust over parts of Texas and New Mexico.
Published Apr 11, 2019Image of the Day Atmosphere Land Dust and Haze Remote Sensing
Unusual late-season events could produce long-term changes to the snowpack on the Larsen C ice shelf.
Published Apr 11, 2019
Large and wealthy cities have the biggest carbon footprints.
Published Apr 10, 2019
When fuels such as coal, wood, and oil burn incompletely, they produce carbon monoxide. The gas is spread by winds and circulation. These maps show monthly averages of CO in the lower atmosphere.
NASA Armstrong's aerial photographer took some beautiful pictures of the wildflower super bloom in California.
Published Apr 10, 2019 in Earth Matters
Net radiation is the balance between incoming and outgoing energy at the top of the atmosphere. It is the total energy available to influence climate after light and heat are reflected, absorbed, or emitted by clouds and land.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a different part of the world? What would the weather be like? What kinds of animals would you see? Which plants live there? By investigating these questions, you are learning about biomes.
Published Oct 5, 2000
The Landsat 8 satellite acquired a scene of contrasts in Siberia.
Published Apr 9, 2019
Join in a citizen science effort to observe, report, and remove mosquito breeding sites in your community.
Published Apr 8, 2019 in Earth Matters
The state jumped from mid-winter right into late spring, setting monthly temperature records in many cities and towns.
Published Apr 8, 2019
Carbon flows between the atmosphere, land, and ocean in a cycle that encompasses nearly all life and sets the thermostat for Earth's climate. By burning fossil fuels, people are changing the carbon cycle with far-reaching consequences.
Published Jun 16, 2011
An outlet glacier in the Russian High Arctic has scientists rethinking how rapidly glaciers in cold, dry areas can move.
Published Apr 5, 2019
Though the end of winter and start of spring have brought seasonal floods here since ancient times, this spring has been severe in some areas of Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Afghanistan.
Published Apr 5, 2019
The Surat Basin has 150 million-year-old sediments, four billion tons of proven thermal coal resources, and a bunch of cows.
Published Apr 5, 2019
The salt produced from tidal marshes in southern France is the product of ideal climate conditions and careful management.
Published Apr 3, 2019
Tropical cyclone Veronica appears to have stirred up swirls of phytoplankton.
Published Apr 3, 2019
Big rain events in Queensland can alter the landscape for months as water—and then a carpet of vegetation—moves toward Lake Eyre.
Published Apr 2, 2019
Sea salt, volcanic ash, dust, wildfire smoke, and industrial pollution are types of airborne aerosols. Natural aerosols tend to be larger than human-made aerosols. These maps show when and where aerosols come from nature, humans, or both.
Erbil Citadel is possibly the oldest continuously occupied human settlement on Earth.
Published Apr 1, 2019
These maps depict monthly total rainfall around the world. Rainfall is the primary source of fresh water for humans, plants, and animals. Rain also moves heat between the atmosphere, oceans, and land.
Like many glaciers around the world, this glacier in the Swiss Alps is shrinking.
Published Mar 29, 2019
Ocean temperatures can influence weather, such as hurricane formation, and climate patterns, such as El Niño. These maps show the temperature at the surface of the world’s seas and oceans.
A stunning aurora appeared over Hudson Bay in March, historically the most geomagnetically active month.
Published Mar 29, 2019
Spring melting of snow and ice in the Tien Shan offers an essential source of fresh water in an otherwise dry region.
Published Mar 29, 2019
Researchers are using Facebook data to observe population movements during disasters.
Published Mar 28, 2019
The spring thaw is underway in the Great Lakes region of North America.
Published Mar 27, 2019
The powerful storm knocked out power across Mozambique's second-largest port city.
Published Mar 26, 2019Image of the Day Atmosphere Land Water Severe Storms Human Presence Remote Sensing
NASA has a unique vantage point for observing the beauty and wonder of Earth and for making sense of it. The images in this book tell a story of a 4.5-billion-year-old planet where there is always something new to see.
Published Feb 20, 2019
After thinning at alarming rates in the 1980s and 90s, the ozone layer over Antarctica is starting to recover. Watch how ozone concentrations in the stratosphere have changed from 1979 through 2018.
Published Feb 13, 2019Atmosphere Human Presence Remote Sensing World of Change Videos
Once the fourth-largest lake in the world, the Aral Sea has been slowly disappearing since the 1960s. View how the lake has shrunk over the past few decades.
Published Dec 5, 2018
Satellite images of Earth at night have been a curiosity for the public and a tool of fundamental research for at least 25 years. They have provided a broad, beautiful picture, showing how humans have shaped the planet and lit up the darkness.
Published Apr 12, 2017
NASA scientist Doug Rowland travels with his team to Svalbard, Norway, for the VISIONS-2 sounding rocket campaign. The team will launch two suborbital rockets in order to understand how the aurora heats the atmosphere and “boils” oxygen off into space.
Published Nov 21, 2018 in Notes From the Field
Here are eight places on Earth where the fall foliage wowed us.
Published Oct 23, 2018
