Annotated Version
The Day fire has been burning in Ventura County in Southern California
since Labor Day, and has consumed more than 160,000 acres. As of September
29, it was 63 percent contained. The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission
and Reflection Radiometer on NASA's Terra satellite flew over the fire at
10 p.m. Pacific Time on September 28, and imaged the fire with its
infrared camera. The hottest areas of active burning appear as red spots
on the image. The blue-green background is a daytime image acquired in
June, used as a background to allow firefighters to localize the hot
spots.
With its 14 spectral bands from the visible to the thermal infrared
wavelength region, and its high spatial resolution of 15 to 90 meters
(about 50 to 300 feet), ASTER images Earth to map and monitor the changing
surface of our planet.
ASTER is one of five Earth-observing instruments launched December 18,
1999, on NASA's Terra satellite. The instrument was built by Japan's
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. A joint U.S./Japan science team
is responsible for validation and calibration of the instrument and the
data products.
The broad spectral coverage and high spectral resolution of ASTER provides
scientists in numerous disciplines with critical information for surface
mapping, and monitoring of dynamic conditions and temporal change. Example
applications are: monitoring glacial advances and retreats; monitoring
potentially active volcanoes; identifying crop stress; determining cloud
morphology and physical properties; wetlands evaluation; thermal pollution
monitoring; coral reef degradation; surface temperature mapping of soils
and geology; and measuring surface heat balance.
The U.S. science team is located at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
Pasadena, Calif. The Terra mission is part of NASA's Science Mission
directorate.
Size: 22.5 by 31.0 kilometers (12.6 by 15.2 miles)
Location: 34.6 degrees North latitude, 119.1 degrees West longitude
Orientation: North at top
Image Data: ASTER Bands 4, 2, and 1
Original Data Resolution: ASTER 15 meters (49.2 feet) and 30 meters (98.4 feet)
Dates Acquired: September 28, 2006 and June 19 2006