ISS015-E-5977 Click the photo number to access all resolutions available and the database record.
In addition to the urban structures of the Den Helder area (reddish-gray to gray street grids) and dockyards to the east of the city, several striking natural features are visible. The prominent branching pattern of the extensive gray mudflats (image bottom right) indicate that this image was acquired at low tide, and show the generally low elevation of the region. Parallel wave patterns along the mudflats and in the Marsdiep Strait are formed as water interacts with the sea bottom between Den Helder and Texel Island during tidal flow. (Some ship wakes are also visible.) The bright, white-gray triangular region at the southern tip of Texel Island (image upper left) is a dune field, consisting mainly of eolian (wind-borne) sands deposited during the last ice age. Subsequent sea level rise and shoreline processes have shifted these sands into their current configuration, which includes a new dune field island to the southwest of Texel.
