satellite data News

High heat and conditioning throughout this year’s melt season put a hurting on Arctic sea ice, but it may still take big storms or more heat to break 2012 extent record.

Brazil’s Bolsonaro government, angered over rising Amazon deforestation statistics, has fired the head of INPE, Brazil’s highly regarded satellite monitoring program.

Bolsonaro officials say Brazilian Amazon deforestation data is being manipulated, but offer no evidence. Early data, though not definitive, shows a 2019 increase in deforestation.

A very hot Arctic spring has caused sea ice volume to fall rapidly to a new record, putting 2019 in position to challenge 2012 for lowest ice volume and extent this September.

Until recently, researchers knew of four lakes lying hidden underneath the Greenland ice sheet. Now, scientists say they’ve identified 56 more, bringing the total to 60 known subglacial lakes beneath…

Newly released data based on analysis of satellite imagery suggests that deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has risen relative to last year. On June 21, the Brazil-based research NGO Imazon…

Though the trend can still change, Arctic sea ice extent could be on track for a record melt year, impacting the jet stream and bringing more extreme weather to the U.S. and world.

In mid-May Chile finalized an agreement to publicly share proprietary data from its satellite system for monitoring fishing boats, known as a Vessel Monitoring System. The country will share the…

A new report examines the “unchecked development” in the Amazon that has driven deforestation rates to near-record levels throughout the world’s largest tropical forest. The main drivers of deforestation vary…

JAKARTA — Many of the fishing vessels operating in Indonesia’s waters at night do so undetected, masking what could be illegal fishing on a massive scale, according to a new…

Any aquarist who has tried to grow a variety of the colorful Acropora coral in a hobby tank knows how delicate they are – “not for beginners.” And yet this…

Life on this planet, in all its wide diversity, is disappearing more quickly now than it has at any time in human history, and some 1 million species of plants…

The ‘landscape of fear’ is not a new term among biologists. From the now-iconic study of how elk and bison gradually adjusted their vigilance levels after wolves were reintroduced into…

Gliding over the moors of England in search of prey, the hen harrier (Circus cyaneus) may never have suspected it would itself fall prey to a greater predator—man. Scientists have…

Sea ice melt is nearly two weeks ahead of past records for early April, while a new study finds that the Arctic system is trending away from its 20th century state into an unprecedented state.

Though sea ice extent was up across much of the Arctic at winter maximum, the Bering Sea lost an ice area the size of Montana, and Greenland has been receiving winter rains.

The United Nations’ Green Climate Fund (GCF) has accepted the first proposal for REDD+ results-based payouts from Brazil, effectively paying the country for reducing its deforestation rates in 2014 and…

Blue whales in the northern Pacific Ocean use their memories to guide them to the best feeding spots, instead of seeking out the locations of shorter-term surges in prey, a…

Human-dominated mangroves are far from what is considered an ideal environment for otters. And yet an estuarine island on India’s western coast is home to a thriving population of the…

In a classic poem, an ancient mariner finds himself haunted by the albatross he killed. Two hundred years after Samuel Coleridge penned that poem, albatrosses still follow fishing ships. But…

Researchers and forest managers working to record and reduce the rapid loss of forests are now armed with a new tool to monitor vegetation across the globe. In December 2018,…

Spatial data from satellites are now fine-scale enough to provide land use and vegetation cover information at the level of individual farms. An international team of researchers examined the potential…

Antarctica is losing ice at a rate that’s about six times faster than in the late 1970s, and that’s pushed up the global sea level by around 14 millimeters (0.55…

Burning wood pellets, once deemed as carbon neutral, produces big CO2 emissions instead. But developed nations are cooking the books on bioenergy, toying with climate disaster.

Animal tracking has revolutionized our study of animal movements and behavior. Radio transmitter tags, followed by GPS and other satellite-based tags, placed on animals via a collar, harness, glue, or…

Of gaps and limitations Our knowledge about sea animals is riddled with holes. We may study and record sea lion colonies or sea turtle nesting and hatching events as they…

NUSA DUA, Indonesia — In a bid to beef up fisheries security, Panama and Namibia have announced their intentions to make information on the location of fishing boats in their…

LIMA, Peru — On Oct. 25, the Peruvian government made public its satellite surveillance data on 1,300 commercial fishing vessels plying Peru’s waters via the open-access platform Global Fishing Watch.…

NYERI, Kenya - It took nine hours for Margaret Wanjugu and neighbors to put out a fire that razed Gathorongai forest near her home in central Kenya, in 2016. She…

The recent top stories from our Spanish-language service, Mongabay Latam, concerned hungry manatees in Venezuelan zoos; giant tortoises stolen from the Galápagos Islands; and a ban on free, prior and…