Using satellite data on how water moves around Earth, NASA scientists solved two mysteries about wobbles in the planet’s rotation. Earth's spin axis drifts slowly around the poles; the farthest away it has wobbled since observations began is 37 feet (12 meters). These wobbles don't affect daily life, but they must be taken into account to get accurate results from GPS, Earth-observing satellites and ground-based observatories.
OMG Measuring Greenland's Seafloor
NASA's Oceans Melting Greenland (OMG) field campaign is gathering data that will help scientists understand how the oceans are joining with the atmosphere to melt the vast ice sheet as well as predict the extent and timing of the resulting sea-level rise.
NASA, Japan Make ASTER Earth Data Available At No Cost
Beginning today, all Earth imagery from a prolific Japanese remote sensing instrument operating aboard NASA’s Terra spacecraft since late 1999 is now available to users everywhere at no cost. The public will have unlimited access to the complete 16-plus-year...
March Snowfall across European Alps
The European Alps stretch 1,200 kilometers (750 miles) across eight countries, and it's the longest mountain chain situated entirely within Europe. The Alps include more than 100 peaks higher than 4,000 meters (13,000 feet), and this image from NASA's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on its Terra satellite beautifully captures a recent snowfall across the region.
NASA Gets Down to Earth This Year With Globe-Spanning Expeditions
NASA is sending scientists around the world in 2016 – from the edge of the Greenland ice sheet to the coral reefs of the South Pacific – to delve into challenging questions about how our planet is changing and what impacts humans are having on it. While Earth...
Atmospheric River Storms Can Reduce Sierra Snow
A new study by NASA and several partners found that in California's Sierra Nevada, atmospheric river storms are two-and-a-half times more likely than other types of winter storms to result in destructive rain-on-snow events, where rain falls on existing snowpack, causing it to melt.
Students Select EarthKAM Imagery Sites
Students participating in NASA's EarthKAM program can request photographs of specific Earth features, such as this image of South Africa, which are taken by a special camera mounted on the International Space Station when it passes over those features.
Sentinel Data Wanted
ESA has agreed with NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the US Geological Survey (USGS) to make data available to them from the European Sentinel satellites. With the third Copernicus satellite, Sentinel-3A, recently launched, ESA has...
Landsat Satellite Spots Sunken Ships
Using data from the NASA/USGS Landsat 8 satellite, researchers have detected sediment plumes extending as far as four kilometers downstream from shallow shipwreck sites, demonstrating how satellites may be used to locate the watery graves of coastal shipwrecks.
Eclipse Casts Shadow on Earth
On March 9, 2016, and approximately 1 million miles from Earth, NASA's Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) captured the shadow of the Moon moving across Earth's sunlit face.