Fires Spread Smoke over Buenos Aires

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Out-of-control fires burned in the Parana River floodplain for more than a week in mid-April 2008, the result of pasture and other agricultural fires that got out of control. Smoke has spread over Argentina’s capital, Buenos Aires, several times during the event, closing roads, disrupting air traffic, and sending residents to the hospital with respiratory problems.

On the afternoon of April 21, 2008, the residents of Buenos Aires appeared to be getting a break. This image of the area captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite shows smoke from the still-burning fires (red outlines) heading south. Skies over Rosario and Buenos Aires were relatively clear.

The large image provided above is at MODIS’s maximum spatial resolution (level of detail) of 250 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response Team provides twice-daily images of the region at other resolutions.

NASA image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team. Caption by Rebecca Lindsey.

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