ds, the largest known reservoir of crude bitumen in the world.
By May 5, the wildfires had consumed almost 210,000 acres, and forced the largest evacuation on record in Canada.
Forest and fire management officials in Alberta can turn to Landsat for help with post-fire mitigation activities once the blaze is out. Landsat’s infrared sensors are valuable for producing burn-severity maps and other products quickly after images are acquired.
Lake Levels in Hispaniola Rise Dramatically May 4, 2016
Landsat imagery shows a dramatic change in lakes Azuéi and Enriquillo, inland saltwater lakes on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola that are known for their crocodiles and iguanas.
A Landsat 7 image acquired in March 2002 showed Lake Enriquillo in the Dominican Republic at half the size it is now. In March 2016, Landsat 8 found a growing lake that has engulfed 40,000 acres of farmland and displaced thousands of families. Similarly in Haiti, Lake Azuéi grew 40 percent in that time period, and now stretches even farther across the border into the Dominican Republic.
Lake levels were high 30 years ago, and have fluctuated depending on rainfall and weather patterns. But a consortium of scientists from the United States and Dominican Republic studying this latest phenomenon call a dramatic rise between 2004 and 2009 unprecedented. The Dominican government believes water from the Rio Yaque del Sur, the nation’s second-longest river, is channeling into Lake Enriquillo through agricultural canals after heavy rain events.
Dominican leaders hope damming the Yaque will stymie the growing lakes. Otherwise, they fear the lakes will continue to swallow more farmland as they threaten a fragile ecosystem.
A single Landsat satellite images this area—and any area around the globe—every 16 days, giving scientists a continuous ability to monitor and perhaps mitigate the situation. With the Hispaniola economy already suffering, with Cao Cao and other bird species continuing to lose their nesting habitat, and with crocodiles and endangered iguanas being forced to higher ground to compete with humans and other wildlife, a solution can’t come soon enough.
Landsat Played Role in Confirming 1986 Chernobyl Disaster April 25, 2016
When the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded 30 years ago, on April 26, 1986, Landsat 5 was the first civilian satellite to confirm the disaster near Pripyat, Ukraine, in the agricultural heartland of the Soviet Union.
Soviet officials initially denied the explosion in the plant’s Reactor Number 4, which destroyed part of the reactor containment building, ignited graphite in the core, and spewed radioactivity into the atmosphere for 10 days. Three days after the explosion, data from Landsat 5’s near-infrared band 7 confirmed a bright red spot within the plant complex—the exposed burning graphite of the damaged reactor shown immediately at right.
Landsat revealed more than that. Images acquired before the explosion show heated water being pumped from the plant into the adjacent cooling pond and circulating counter-clockwise. Under normal circumstances, Landsat 5’s thermal infrared band 6 would confirm that the heated water—orange in the image—gradually turns yellow and then blue as it cools. But the image from April 29 indicates all the water in the pond is the same temperature, evidence the plant was not operating.
Pressed by growing evidence from Landsat and other satellite imagery, reticent Soviet officials only slowly confirmed the facts. General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev did not speak publicly about the disaster until May 14, 1986. Pripyat was abandoned, its people relocated.
At present, the natural environment in the 18-mile exclusion zone around Chernobyl continues to recover. These Landsat images show the change from a previously vibrant agricultural and forestry economy in April 1986 to October 2015, when crops have been replaced by thick grasslands. Today, nearby farm fields are excluded from use by government officials—a prohibition expected to remain for a long time.
Wildfires Scorch Large Swaths Along Oklahoma-Kansas 