Fires Across Northern South America

  • Credit

    Image courtesy NCAR and University of Toronto MOPITT Teams

Biomass burning has been particularly intense in northern South America in recent months. This new MOPITT image shows concentrations over the region as recent as March 18, 2003.

Fires continue to burn across northern South America over large regions of Colombia and Venezuela. Measurements of carbon monoxide (CO) from the Measurements of Pollution in The Troposphere (MOPITT) instrument on NASA’s Terra satellite show very high concentrations over the region of the fires. This false-color image shows the mixing ratios of CO at an altitude of about 3 km (700 hPa) averaged from March 13-18, 2003. Gray areas indicate where no data are available, either due to cloud cover or gaps between satellite views. The concentrations observed during this period are higher than those measured a couple weeks earlier. The highest concentrations correlate well with the recent images of the fires observed by MODIS. Relatively high mixing ratios also are seen being transported to the west over the Pacific Ocean, and to the north into the Caribbean Sea.

Metadata

  • Sensor

    Terra/MOPITT

  • Start Date

    2003-03-18

  • Event Start Date

    2002-12-12

  • NH Image ID

    7126

  • NH Event ID

    5185

  • NH Posting Date

    2003-03-24