Bahamas and Cuba

Clear skies and calm waters allowed MODIS to capture this stunning image of the Bahamas and Cuba on March 16, 2002. In the image9s center, Andros Island is surrounded by the bright blue halo of Great Bahama Bank. The Great Bahama Bank is a coral reef limestone platform that was slowly inundated by rising sea levels between 10,000 and 2500 years ago, as the last ice age glaciers were melting. In most places the water above the shelf doesn9t exceed 6 m. The white limestone under the shallow waters is what causes the bright blue halo. The margins of the shelf can drop off steeply, for example on the Atlantic Ocean side (right of the island in this image), a nearly vertical drop to depths of 4000 m explains the thinness of the blue perimeter, while on the western side, the shelf is much wider.

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Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC

Published April 3, 2002
Data acquired March 16, 2002

Source:

Terra > MODIS

Collection:

Visible Earth