Scores of fires were burning in Mexico and Central America on April 16, 2003. This image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Aqua satellite shows part of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula and northern Guatemala where an especially high number of fires were detected (marked in red). The high-resolution scene shows fires stretching northward into Mexico and southward into numerous Central American countries. Smoke plumes are drifting out overt the Gulf of Mexico to the northwest. Beneath the smoke, the colorful swirls in the water may be a mixture of sediment and marine plant life known as phytoplankton.
The high-resolution image provided above is 500 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at MODIS? maximum spatial resolution of 250 meters.
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Image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
