NASA MODIS Image of the Day: January 26, 2008 – Floods in Australia
Rivers across Queensland, Australia, ran high in the wake of heavy summer rain in early 2008.
The main image, captured by the MODIS on the Terra satellite on January 22, 2008, illustrates just how wide-spread the flooding was.
The image covers approximately 960 kilometers (about 600 miles) north to south, and rivers along this entire length are notably flooded. Rivers in inland Queensland tend to be seasonal in nature, swelling during the summer monsoon, and shrinking or disappearing at other times of the year. If you move your mouse over the image, you will see a secondary one from January 6, 2008, also from the Terra MODIS, which shows southern Queensland just as the rivers were beginning to expand. The images are false color, meaning that the scene does not appear as the human eye would see it. Instead, the images were made with a combination of infrared and visible light to make water stand out distinctly from the surrounding landscape. Water is black in this type of image. Mud-laden water (as in the flooded rivers) or very muddy earth is dusty blue, while dry earth covered by few or no plants is tan. Plant-covered land is bright green, and clouds are turquoise and white. The silver-white streak on the surface of the ocean is reflected sunlight. In the true-color, photo-like version of the scene, the muddy rivers blend in with the brown earth. Daily images of Queensland in both true and false color are available from the MODIS Rapid Response System.
