This page contains archived content and is no longer being updated. At the time of publication, it represented the best available science.
Here’s another chance to play geographical detective! These images from
the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) were captured by the
instrument’s nadir camera on July 31, 2002, and show a natural-color (top)
and false-color (bottom) view of a 291 kilometer x 158 kilometer area.
The false-color image includes data from the camera’s near-infrared
band, and accentuates the appearance of vegetation. North is toward the top.
Below are nine statements about the large, leaf-shaped island in the lower
left part of the image area. Only some of these statements are true. Use any
reference materials you like, and mark each statement true or false:
The island is known by at least three different names.
At least one language spoken on the island is not in common usage anywhere
else.
The capital city of the province to which this island belongs is located
within 200 kilometers of the northern boundary of the image area.
The island’s shores are home to its country’s most spectacular
coral reefs.
Due to the extreme depth of the sea floor surrounding the island, sea level
fluctuations during the Quaternary Period have not changed the horizontal
location of its coastline by more than 500 meters.
There are no fruit bats on the island.
The region within which the island is situated harbors a freshwater turtle
that is exceptional in its possession of an anatomical characteristic otherwise
typical of marine turtles.
Insect control has been tested as a means of combatting an invasive aquatic
weed that threatens wetland habitats in the island’s vicinity.
Species of Avicennia are found in the island’s coastal regions.
Full rules and guidelines are available at MISR's Where on Earth...? page.
Named Isla de Aves in Spanish, (meaning “Island of the Birds”) Aves Island lies west of the Lesser Antilles in the Caribbean. It provides a nesting site to green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas) and, of course, birds. Because the abundant bird droppings, known as guano, could be used in fertilizer and gunpowder, guano miners worked on the island until they depleted the supply. Since its discovery by Europeans, likely in the late 16th century, Aves Island was subsequently claimed by several European nations. The island is currently claimed by Venezuela, although disputes about ownership of the island, and the surrounding exclusive economic zone in the Caribbean, continue today.
The ghostly white shapes northeast and immediately southwest of Wrangel Island are sea ice. Over the course of the satellite record, Arctic sea ice has advanced and retreated past Wrangel Island many times. From 1979 to 2000, the sea ice edge at the end of summer generally fell somewhere in the vicinity of Wrangel Island, but this is not the first summer when the sea ice edge has retreated well north of the island.
