5) The Seasons
Photo credit: NASA/Reto Stockli
Us land-dwellers can see this fascinating transformation of seasons, thanks to satellite imagery from NASA. When monthly images of the planet are combined in an animation, they reveal the ebb and flow of polar ice, the dry and wet seasons in the tropics, as well as the growth and death cycles of vegetation throughout the world.
Perhaps most mesmerizing is seeing how Arctic ice forms and then recedes each year.
4) Volcanic Eruptions
Although we’d expect to see massive volcanic eruptions from space, it’s somewhat surprising to find out that around 50 to 60 eruptions happen on the planet each year.
The Sarychev volcano (seen above) in the northwest Pacific Ocean is one of the most active volcanoes in the world.In the 2009 eruption, shock waves opened a hole in the clouds above the blast, allowing astronauts to get an amazingly clear photo of the phenomenon.
3)The Border Between India And Pakistan
Photo credit: NASA/JSC
There’s no better vantage point than space to see the expansive beauty of the planet and the interconnectedness of the human race. However, even getting hundreds of kilometers above Earth isn’t far enough away to blur some of the ugly sides of life and the divisions we create between each other.
Take, for instance, the man-made border between India and Pakistan. These two countries are at such odds that they’ve erected a physical, militarized border which remains lit by floodlights at night to prevent ammunition trafficking and terrorist crossings. There’s such a bright, orange glow along the border that the 2,900-kilometer demarcation line is easily pinpointed from the International Space Station.
Over the past decades, the Indo-Pak border has been one of the most dangerous places in the world, plagued by lawlessness, violence, and deadly wars.
2) Deforestation
Photo credit: NASA
The benefit of looking down on the Earth from above is that it’s sometimes easier to get a real perspective of what’s happening with the planet. One such example of this is with deforestation over Amazon Rain-forest.
1)The Borders Between Wealthy And Poorer Nations
Photo credit: NASA/JSC
In the picture above, we see South Korea illuminated vibrantly in the bottom right corner (Seoul is the brightest spot) while China is equally dazzling on the other side of the photo. But where’s North Korea? No, it didn’t sink into the ocean; it’s actually the black mass between the lights of South Korea and China. (Also note the curvy, orange border of the DZ). The only visible illumination in that area is the capital city, Pyongyang. While North Korea certainly isn’t guilty of light pollution, this image reveals how much of the country is likely living without basic electricity and all that comes with it: heat in the winter, refrigeration, and adequate hospitals.
Photo credit: NASA/Reto Stockli
Us land-dwellers can see this fascinating transformation of seasons, thanks to satellite imagery from NASA. When monthly images of the planet are combined in an animation, they reveal the ebb and flow of polar ice, the dry and wet seasons in the tropics, as well as the growth and death cycles of vegetation throughout the world.
Perhaps most mesmerizing is seeing how Arctic ice forms and then recedes each year.
4) Volcanic Eruptions
 |
| The Sarychev volcano |
Although we’d expect to see massive volcanic eruptions from space, it’s somewhat surprising to find out that around 50 to 60 eruptions happen on the planet each year.
The Sarychev volcano (seen above) in the northwest Pacific Ocean is one of the most active volcanoes in the world.In the 2009 eruption, shock waves opened a hole in the clouds above the blast, allowing astronauts to get an amazingly clear photo of the phenomenon.
3)The Border Between India And Pakistan
Photo credit: NASA/JSC
There’s no better vantage point than space to see the expansive beauty of the planet and the interconnectedness of the human race. However, even getting hundreds of kilometers above Earth isn’t far enough away to blur some of the ugly sides of life and the divisions we create between each other.
Take, for instance, the man-made border between India and Pakistan. These two countries are at such odds that they’ve erected a physical, militarized border which remains lit by floodlights at night to prevent ammunition trafficking and terrorist crossings. There’s such a bright, orange glow along the border that the 2,900-kilometer demarcation line is easily pinpointed from the International Space Station.
Over the past decades, the Indo-Pak border has been one of the most dangerous places in the world, plagued by lawlessness, violence, and deadly wars.
Photo credit: NASA
The benefit of looking down on the Earth from above is that it’s sometimes easier to get a real perspective of what’s happening with the planet. One such example of this is with deforestation over Amazon Rain-forest.
Photo credit: NASA/JSC
In the picture above, we see South Korea illuminated vibrantly in the bottom right corner (Seoul is the brightest spot) while China is equally dazzling on the other side of the photo. But where’s North Korea? No, it didn’t sink into the ocean; it’s actually the black mass between the lights of South Korea and China. (Also note the curvy, orange border of the DZ). The only visible illumination in that area is the capital city, Pyongyang. While North Korea certainly isn’t guilty of light pollution, this image reveals how much of the country is likely living without basic electricity and all that comes with it: heat in the winter, refrigeration, and adequate hospitals.
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