NASA MODIS Image of the Day: February 20, 2012 – Snow in western Canada
By mid-February, 2012 seasonal snow storms had covered the green forests and plains of western Canada with a patchwork of winter white.
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board NASA’s Terra satellite acquired this true-color image on February 11, 2011.
At the top of the image, from east to west, the Canadian provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta can be seen, entirely covered in snow except for the southwestern prairie of Saskatchewan, where the senescent vegetation appears brown. In Manitoba, bright white ice covers large Lake Winnipeg (east) and Lake Manitoba (west). South of the Canadian border, snow also covers much of the United States. On February 15, CBCnews Manitoba reported that the province was experiencing an unusually mild and dry winter this year. Only 48 centimeters of snow has fallen to date, and that is well below the average snowfall of 75 centimeters. Further west, some resorts in Alberta and British Columbia have reported heavy snowfalls. Marmot Basin, near Jasper, British Columbia (to the west of this image) by February 8 had reported over 12 feet of snowfall, or 90% of the annual average.
