Sentinel-3A was launched on February 16th 2016 and delivered its first image only two weeks later, on February 29th. With 2020 being a leapyear as well, we want to take the chance to celebrate its fourth anniversary with some of our favourite images from all over the globe. Have a look!
One of the first images that is officially available on the Copernicus Data Hub shows an almost cloudfree Iceland and the easternmost coastal brash
ice zone of Greenland.
Algal blooms in Lake Erie, USA, form beautiful, yet often harmful, bright green patches over vast areas. They are caused by the combination of nutrients being washed into the lake
from the surrounding agricultural areas and warm summer temperatures.
This stunning image shows Hurricane Harvey, as it made landfall along the coast of Mexico and Texas, USA. It was one of the most devastating storms in US hurricane history, bringing
not only extreme windspeeds, but also heavy rain and causing unprecedented floodings.
Every spring / early summer, phytoplankton blooms occur in the cold and nutrient-rich arctic waters, forming spectacular patterns across hundreds of kilometers.
The famous glacier starred in the great documentary Chasing Ice (www.chasingice.com), where parts of the longest calving event ever recorded were shown. In this spectacular image,
the long ice front is visible, reaching into the ocean like a white finger. Numerous melting ponds on the Greenlandic ice shield with more than 3km in diameter are visible as well, while
the clouds of the low-pressure system in the North form a sharp edge at the coastline.
As the third-largest river in North America, the Saint Lawrence River drains the Great Lakes into the Atlantic. In this spring scene from April 2019, traces of high sediment flow on the
river are clearly visible. The high sediment flow is due to the combination of frozen ground with accelerated spring melt, as well as heavy rain fall events in the region.
After days of storm and heavy rains, the Yellow Sea, located between China and the Korean Peninsula, is rich with sediments that form artful patterns across the whole bay.