Shuttle-Mir Program Earth Science Early Results

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Water Features and Water Issues: North America and South America

NM21-765-012 Obregon Reservoir, Sonora, Mexico A severe drought extending until late summer, 1996 worried farmers and city officials throughout the south-central U.S. and northern Mexico. Water levels in rivers and reservoirs throughout Texas and Mexico reached low stands by July. This photograph of a large reservoir on Mexico's Yagui River is typical of the regional drought conditions. The white fringe around the reservoir shows how much the water level has dropped in this particular lake. Monsoonal rains in August began to offset the drought's impact.

NM22-705-059 Amistad Reservoir, Texas Severe drought in the summer of 1996 over the southwest portion of the U.S. and northern Mexico drained water in rivers and reservoirs to dangerously low levels. This is a view of Amistad reservoir, a major reservoir in west Texas. The white shoreline ringing the lake is generally submerged below the lake at times of higher water. Shortly after this image was taken, the reservoir began to fill with heavy fall and spring rainfall. A photograph documenting the higher water was taken during the Mir 23 mission (spring 1997).

NM22-720-009 Altiplano, Central Andes The large lakes and salars of the Andean altiplano are excellent indicators of the relative rainfall in the region. Water in Lake Poopo, a shallow lake in Bolivia SE of Lake Titicaca has been monitored from space for more than ten years. The water levels in the lake were quite high from 1985 to 1990 (note 51J-144-0023, a comparative view from 1985). Between 1991 and 1996, the lake dried up except for brief periods during the wet season. These photos show the lake with almost no water. Subsequent imagery taken in early 1997 shows floods into the lake, indicating greater amounts of rainfall in the region. The pattern of precipitation may have links to the El Nino phenomenon.

NM23-714-627 Spring, 1997 photograph of Lake Poopo and Salar Coipasa in the Andean Altiplano. Both lakes are in flood. Compare with NM22-720-009.

NM22-728-078 Oregon Coast, Internal Waves in the Pacific Sunglint reveals details of structures offshore from the Columbia River, including the surface swells, internal waves impinging on the coast, and longshore currents. Such a view provides a means of visualizing the dynamic phenomena such as surface features which can otherwise be sampled only in point locations, and extrapolated through models.

This service is provided by the International Space Station program and the JSC Astromaterials Research & Exploration Science Directorate. Recommended Citation: Image Science and Analysis Laboratory, NASA-Johnson Space Center. "The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth." .
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