ICELAND - This stretch of Iceland's northern coast resembles a tiger's head complete with stripes of orange, black, and white. The tiger's mouth is the Eyjafjorour fjord that juts into the mainland between steep mountains. The name means "island fjord".
Thanks to the magic of Landsat satellites that are whizzing around overhead, we can see snapshots of our fragile planet from above, showcasing a range of dazzling landscapes. We see a huge diversity of scenes, from mountainous tributaries to jam-packed urban areas. Many of the images are in false-color to give the viewer the best topographical detail possible. Presented by Time and Google, it’s another reminder of just how beautifully unique Earth is.
COLIMA VOLCANO, MEXICO. Snow-capped Colima Volcano rises abruptly from the surrounding landscape in the state of Jalisco. Colima is actually a melding of two volcanoes, Nevado de Colima to the north and the active Volcan de Colima to the south.NETHERLANDS. Along the south coast of the Netherlands, sediment-laden rivers have created a massive delta of islands and waterways. After severe spring tides in 1953, the Dutch built an elaborate system of dikes to hold back the North Sea.GANGES RIVER, INDIA. The Ganges River forms an extensive delta where it empties into the Bay of Bengal. The delta is largely covered with a swamp forest known as the Sunderbans, which is home to the Royal Bengal Tiger.FLORIDA EVERGLADES. The Florida Everglades the southern tip of the Florida Peninsula and most of Florida Bay, Everglades National Park is the only subtropical preserve in North America. It is the only place in the world where alligators and crocodiles exist side by side.LAKE DISAPPOINTMENT, AUSTRALIA. Surrounded by sand dunes, Lake Disappointment is an ephemeral salt lake in one of the most remote areas of Western Australia.
LENA RIVER, RUSSIA. The Lena River, some 2,800 miles(4,500km) long, is one of the largest rivers in the world. The Lena Delta Reserve is the most extensive protected wilderness area in Russia. It is an important breeding ground for many species of Siberian wildlife.
MALASPINA GLACIER- The tongue of the Malaspina Glacier, the largest glacier in Alaska, fills most of this image. The Malaspina lies west of Yakutat Bay and covers 1,500 sq m.NIGER RIVER, MALI. Coursing through parched, landlocked Mali in Western Africa, the Niger River flows north through an ancient sand sea before turning sharply east to skirt the edge of the dune-striped Sahara.GREAT SALT DESERT, IRAN. Like poster paints run wild, this image reveals a montage of landscapes in Iran’s largest desert, the Dasht-e Kavir, or Great Salt Desert. The almost uninhabited region covers an area of over 32,000 sq ft.SYRIAN DESERT. Between the fertile Euphrates River valley and the cultivated lands of the eastern Mediterranean coast, the Syrian Desert covers parts of modern Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq.
The Landsat program has been photographing the planet since 1972, which makes it the longest continuous record of the Earth’s surface that exists, and the images here come from a collaboration between Time and Google that stitched millions of those frames into a timelapse of the whole planet. The colors are not lies so much as translations. Landsat’s sensors see infrared as well as visible light, and analysts assign those invisible bands to red, green or blue so that healthy vegetation, bare rock, water and ice each stand out. The same view from a human eye appears in cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin’s photographs from the space station and Don Pettit’s images from orbit. For the false-color look at ground level, see Norway in infrared.
