The Pampanga River in southern Luzon was flowing over its banks on January 31, 2006, when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured the top image. The floods were caused by Tropical Depression Agaton, which hit the island on January 26. The largest of the islands in the Philippines, Luzon is prone to tropical storms and is usually struck by five or six systems in a year. Though Agaton was not a large storm as tropical cyclones go, the floods it caused cost an estimated 9.6 million dollars in damages, reports the Dartmouth Flood Observatory
The flooded regions on the Pampanga River are dark blue and black in this false color image. Clouds are pale blue and white, and plant-covered land is bright green. On January 17, lower image, the river was not visible in the blue network of wetlands that surround it. The river flows into Manila Bay. Manila, the capital of the Philippines, is on the east side of the bay, near the lower edge of the images.
NASA images created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of the MODIS Rapid Response team and the Goddard Earth Sciences DAAC.
