. | . |
Mouth of the mighty Yangtze
The coloured waters shown here in this 21 March Envisat Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) image have concluded a long journey across China. They are surging into the East China Sea from the mouth of the Yangtze River, which at 6300 km long is the longest river in Asia and the third longest in the world. Rising in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, the Yangtze River snakes through nine provinces and serves as a drain for 1.8 million square kilometres of territory. MERIS is designed to detect ocean colour, and clearly visible here is how the Yangtze's heavy sediment plume discharges into and colours the waters along the Chinese coast. Its total sediment load is estimated at 680 million tonnes a year � equivalent in weight to a hundred Great Pyramids. Shanghai - China's largest city - is located south of the Yangtze mouth and the 1000-km-long navigable stretch of the Yangtze west of it is a zone of major economic activity. The downside of recent growth has been a decrease in water quality that the Chinese government say it intends to combat. At the start of the month an accidental chemical spill into a tributary of the Yangtze temporarily deprived almost a million people of drinking water. Related Links Envisat SpaceDaily Search SpaceDaily Subscribe To SpaceDaily Express DigitalGlobe Unveils Plans for Next-Generation Spacecraft Constellation Longmont CO - Mar 24, 2004 DigitalGlobe has unveiled details of the company's next-generation imaging satellite, WorldView. The new satellite, set to launch no later than 2006, will be the world's highest resolution commercial imaging satellite with better agility, accuracy and collection capacity than any other known commercial system.
|
|
The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2016 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement All images and articles appearing on Space Media Network have been edited or digitally altered in some way. Any requests to remove copyright material will be acted upon in a timely and appropriate manner. Any attempt to extort money from Space Media Network will be ignored and reported to Australian Law Enforcement Agencies as a potential case of financial fraud involving the use of a telephonic carriage device or postal service. |