Intense agricultural fires and smoke in Northwest India

In northwest India near the Indus River, irrigation supports agricultural production in the Punjab and Haryana provinces of the nation. In these images, numerous agricultural fires are burning in the region, and are marked with red dots. Smoke from the fires is probably contributing significantly to the regional haze seen in both images; however, dust and urban pollution could be factors as well. The haze gets trapped at the base of the Himalaya Mountains (upper right). This images were captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Aqua satellite on October 23 and 25, 2004. MODIS has detected fires in the region each day in the week leading up to October 25.

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Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC

Published October 25, 2004
Data acquired October 23, 2004

Source:

Aqua > MODIS

Collections:

MODIS Rapid Response

Visible Earth