Clouds off the southeastern United States

Scores of tiny white clouds float off of the southeastern coast of the United States, seeming to ripple like waves on water. Toward the outer edges of the cloud bank, the individual clouds are tiny dots that appear sprinkled over the blue and black waters of the Atlantic. Moving farther into the bank, the clouds start to get larger and clumpier-looking, though they remain relatively tiny. About 175 kilometers into the bank (from the northern edge), the clouds clump together into larger clusters as they are carried along by an air current curving east and northeast. Just past this current, the clouds break into smaller bits again, until meeting up with the larger, more solid mass of clouds at the bottom right of the image.

Over land, the skies remain clear, letting the subdued green and brown colors of autumn show. Atlanta, the capital of Georgia, is visible in the upper left corner (grayish smudge), while in Florida, Jacksonville (upper eastern edge, near the Georgia border), Orlando (lower center), and Clearwater (western coast) stand out from the lakes, swamps, and forests. Along the coasts, clouds of sediment deposited by river outlets turn the waters brown and green, eventually fading to blue and black as the water clears. On Florida’s western coast (lower left), sediment in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico is much more pronounced, and stretches kilometers farther off the coast than on the other side of the peninsula.

This true-color Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) image was acquired by the Terra satellite on November 29, 2003.

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Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC

Published December 1, 2003
Data acquired November 29 - 29, 2003

Source:

Terra > MODIS