After 40 years of study anyone would realize scientists would have learned something about Earth. 40 years of dedicated study isn't enough, huh?
For more than forty years, (click here) Landsat satellites have collected images of our planet...millions of them. As Landsat 8 begins its new mission—collecting more than 400 images per day—scientists are anticipating what that trove of observations will reveal about Earth’s surface.
“These are scientific data, as much as they’re beautiful images,” said Doug Morton, a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center who uses Landsat data to study changes in forest ecosystems. “We can see that ecosystems are changing all the time, and Landsat data captures these changes like no other program in the world.”
In one patch of desert, where the Rio Grande makes a border between the United States and Mexico, the Landsats have captured hundreds of images for NASA and its partners at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). Those photo-like, natural-color images show fields turning green and brown with the season; new urban and suburban developments expanding around El Paso, Texas, and Ciudad Juárez, Mexico; changing angles of sunlight; and clouds moving over the neighboring mountains. They also reveal subtle changes in the sensors as technology improves with each generation of satellite....
