Central Africa: 26 September 2000
Forest and Wildland Fires in Africa
26 September 2000
Several active fire signals were recorded by OSEI with the NOAA-14 POES AVHRR HRPT satellite on 25 September 2000 in central-western Africa.
Numerous heat signatures and dense smoke are visible from fires burning in west central Africa.
(Source: NOAA/OSEI)
These images of northeastern South Africa from NASA’s Earth Observatory, near Kruger National Park, were acquired on 7 September 2000 by the Mulit-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer (MISR). The left image shows an 85-kilometer wide x 200-kilometer long area captured by MISR’s aftward- viewing 45-degree camera. At lower left are the Drakensberg Mountains; to the east of this range a large burn scar with thin smoke plumes from still-smoldering fires is visible. Near the top of the image another large burn scar with an open-pit mine at its western edge can be seen. Other burn scars are scattered throughout the image. Just above the center of the lefthand image is a polygonal burn scar with a set of smoke plumes from actively burning fires at its southwestern tip. The righthand image, which is a zoomed-in view of the area, was acquired almost simultaneously by MISR’s airborne counterpart, AirMISR, aboard a NASA ER-2 high-altitude aircraft. AirMISR contains a single camera that rotates to different view angles; when this image was acquired the camera was pointed straight downward. Because the ER-2 aircraft flies at an altitude of 20 kilometers, whereas the Terra spacecraft orbits the Earth 700 kilometers above the ground, the AirMISR image has 35 times finer spatial resolution. The AirMISR image covers about 9 kilometers x 9 kilometers. Unlike the MISR view, the AirMISR data are in raw form and processing to remove radiometric and geometric distortions has not yet been performed. Fires such as those shown in the images are deliberately set to burn off dry vegetation, and constitute a widespread agricultural practice in many parts of Africa. These MISR and AirMISR images are part of an international field, aircraft, and satellite data collection and analysis campaign known as SAFARI-2000, the Southern Africa Regional Science Intitiative. SAFARI-2000 is designed, in part, to study the effects of large-scale human activities on the regional climate, meteorology, and ecosystems.
MISR and AirMISR Simultaneously Observe African Fires
(Source: NASA’s Earth Observatory)
A new TOMS Global Aerosol Hot Spots Page provides screened close-ups of regions with active fires and smoke emissions.
16 September 2000
17 September 2000
18 September 2000
19 September 2000
20 September 2000
21 September 2000
Smoke from vegetation fires in Africa
NOTE: The surface background image used here is NOT part of the TOMS aerosol index retrieval.
(Source: TOMS Global Aerosol Hot Spots Page)
