Smoke Blankets Thailand and Burma (Myanmar)

As observed during previous years in Southeast Asia, large numbers of seasonal agricultural fires and wildfires are creating clouds of smoke over northern Thailand and Burma (Myanmar). The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired this natural-color image on March 18, 2020. The haze and smoke has resulted in unhealthy levels of air pollution, particularly in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, which has had the most polluted air in the world several times this month.

References & Resources

• The Thaiger (2020, March 16) Northern Thailand chokes under shroud of smog. Accessed March 19, 2020.
• The Thaiger (2020, March 15) Smoke and mirrors, northern Thailand’s annual smog problem. Accessed March 19, 2020.

NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS/LANCE and GIBS/Worldview. Text by Kasha Patel.

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March 18, 2020

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