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Landsat satellite imagery captures the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire 🔥

These Landsat images show the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire on Santa Rosa Island, part of Channel Islands National Park off the coast of California. By May 24, the fire had burned more than 18,000 acres across the island’s southeastern terrain, leaving a large, dark burn scar visible from space.

Landsat data are used during and after wildfires to map burned areas, monitor fire progression, assess vegetation damage, evaluate erosion risks, and support long-term ecosystem recovery efforts.

The long-term @usgs and @nasa Landsat record also helps scientists study changing fire patterns and landscape resilience over time. These observations support land managers and fire agencies as they respond to wildfires and assess impacts across affected landscapes. Through the U.S. Wildland Fire Service, federal agencies coordinate wildfire response, risk mitigation, and burned-area rehabilitation across more than 500 million acres of Interior-administered and Tribal lands.

📸 1: Landsat 9 image acquired May 16, 2026, showing active fire fronts and smoke rising from the southeastern portion of Santa Rosa Island shortly after the wildfire was reported.
📸 2: Landsat 8 image acquired May 24, 2026, showing the extensive burn scar left by the Santa Rosa Island Fire across the southeastern end of the island as containment efforts continued.
📸 3: A water scooping aircraft drops water on the Santa Rosa Island Fire on May 19. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service
📸 4: A boat transporting firefighters to the Santa Rosa Island Fire arrives to the island. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service

Landsat satellite imagery captures the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire 🔥

These Landsat images show the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire on Santa Rosa Island, part of Channel Islands National Park off the coast of California. By May 24, the fire had burned more than 18,000 acres across the island’s southeastern terrain, leaving a large, dark burn scar visible from space.

Landsat data are used during and after wildfires to map burned areas, monitor fire progression, assess vegetation damage, evaluate erosion risks, and support long-term ecosystem recovery efforts.

The long-term @usgs and @nasa Landsat record also helps scientists study changing fire patterns and landscape resilience over time. These observations support land managers and fire agencies as they respond to wildfires and assess impacts across affected landscapes. Through the U.S. Wildland Fire Service, federal agencies coordinate wildfire response, risk mitigation, and burned-area rehabilitation across more than 500 million acres of Interior-administered and Tribal lands.

📸 1: Landsat 9 image acquired May 16, 2026, showing active fire fronts and smoke rising from the southeastern portion of Santa Rosa Island shortly after the wildfire was reported.
📸 2: Landsat 8 image acquired May 24, 2026, showing the extensive burn scar left by the Santa Rosa Island Fire across the southeastern end of the island as containment efforts continued.
📸 3: A water scooping aircraft drops water on the Santa Rosa Island Fire on May 19. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service
📸 4: A boat transporting firefighters to the Santa Rosa Island Fire arrives to the island. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service

Landsat satellite imagery captures the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire 🔥

These Landsat images show the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire on Santa Rosa Island, part of Channel Islands National Park off the coast of California. By May 24, the fire had burned more than 18,000 acres across the island’s southeastern terrain, leaving a large, dark burn scar visible from space.

Landsat data are used during and after wildfires to map burned areas, monitor fire progression, assess vegetation damage, evaluate erosion risks, and support long-term ecosystem recovery efforts.

The long-term @usgs and @nasa Landsat record also helps scientists study changing fire patterns and landscape resilience over time. These observations support land managers and fire agencies as they respond to wildfires and assess impacts across affected landscapes. Through the U.S. Wildland Fire Service, federal agencies coordinate wildfire response, risk mitigation, and burned-area rehabilitation across more than 500 million acres of Interior-administered and Tribal lands.

📸 1: Landsat 9 image acquired May 16, 2026, showing active fire fronts and smoke rising from the southeastern portion of Santa Rosa Island shortly after the wildfire was reported.
📸 2: Landsat 8 image acquired May 24, 2026, showing the extensive burn scar left by the Santa Rosa Island Fire across the southeastern end of the island as containment efforts continued.
📸 3: A water scooping aircraft drops water on the Santa Rosa Island Fire on May 19. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service
📸 4: A boat transporting firefighters to the Santa Rosa Island Fire arrives to the island. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service

Landsat satellite imagery captures the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire 🔥

These Landsat images show the progression of the Santa Rosa Island Fire on Santa Rosa Island, part of Channel Islands National Park off the coast of California. By May 24, the fire had burned more than 18,000 acres across the island’s southeastern terrain, leaving a large, dark burn scar visible from space.

Landsat data are used during and after wildfires to map burned areas, monitor fire progression, assess vegetation damage, evaluate erosion risks, and support long-term ecosystem recovery efforts.

The long-term @usgs and @nasa Landsat record also helps scientists study changing fire patterns and landscape resilience over time. These observations support land managers and fire agencies as they respond to wildfires and assess impacts across affected landscapes. Through the U.S. Wildland Fire Service, federal agencies coordinate wildfire response, risk mitigation, and burned-area rehabilitation across more than 500 million acres of Interior-administered and Tribal lands.

📸 1: Landsat 9 image acquired May 16, 2026, showing active fire fronts and smoke rising from the southeastern portion of Santa Rosa Island shortly after the wildfire was reported.
📸 2: Landsat 8 image acquired May 24, 2026, showing the extensive burn scar left by the Santa Rosa Island Fire across the southeastern end of the island as containment efforts continued.
📸 3: A water scooping aircraft drops water on the Santa Rosa Island Fire on May 19. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service
📸 4: A boat transporting firefighters to the Santa Rosa Island Fire arrives to the island. Photo Credit: J Foye / U.S. Wildland Fire Service

40 years of growth in Las Vegas 🏙️

The @nasa @usgs Landsat satellites can sense bigger changes in land cover, such as deforestation or urbanization. Landsat has also been studying our planet for nearly 54 years now. Such a long data record means that scientists can analyze how these changes unfold over the course of decades.

Video description:
Timelapse of satellite images showing urban growth in Las Vegas, Nevada. The timelapse starts in 1985. As the years count up, the gray grids of urbanization expand into the surrounding brown landscape and the city becomes larger and larger. By 2025, the city is much larger than it was at the beginning of the timelapse. Credit: NASA

🌋 46 years ago today, Mount St. Helens forever changed the Pacific Northwest — and the science of volcano monitoring.

After more than a century of quiet, earthquakes and rising magma signaled that pressure was building beneath the volcano in the spring of 1980. On the morning of May 18, the mountain’s north flank collapsed in a massive landslide, triggering a devastating lateral blast that flattened 230 square miles of forest.

Ash rose high into the atmosphere and drifted across the U.S, while volcanic mudflows, known as lahars, surged through nearby valleys to the Columbia River. Fifty-seven people lost their lives, including USGS volcanologist David A. Johnston.

When the eruption ended, Mount St. Helens stood nearly 1,300 feet shorter than before. The eruption transformed not only the landscape, but also how scientists monitor and prepare for volcanic hazards around the world.

➡️ Watch USGS scientists reflect on the eruption through the link in today’s story.

📸: Mount St. Helens erupting above a quiet rural landscape, with ash and steam billowing into the sky. Mount Adams can be seen in the background.

A river of lava glowing in the dark, captured from space 🌋
 
Landsat satellites, a joint mission between @nasa and @usgslandsat don’t always take the night off. By special request, they can collect nighttime imagery that helps scientists monitor erupting volcanoes, wildfires, glaciers at twilight, and more.
 
This nighttime image from Landsat 9 captured Mauna Loa’s 11.3-mile-long lava flow on December 4, 2022, illuminating a plume of ash in the atmosphere above Hawaii. Swipe to see how it looked from the ground the next day.
 
Want to know what a certain volcano, wildfire, or icy landscape looks like after dark from space? Learn more about what Landsat can see at night and how to submit a special imagery request by clicking the link in today’s USGS story.

A river of lava glowing in the dark, captured from space 🌋
 
Landsat satellites, a joint mission between @nasa and @usgslandsat don’t always take the night off. By special request, they can collect nighttime imagery that helps scientists monitor erupting volcanoes, wildfires, glaciers at twilight, and more.
 
This nighttime image from Landsat 9 captured Mauna Loa’s 11.3-mile-long lava flow on December 4, 2022, illuminating a plume of ash in the atmosphere above Hawaii. Swipe to see how it looked from the ground the next day.
 
Want to know what a certain volcano, wildfire, or icy landscape looks like after dark from space? Learn more about what Landsat can see at night and how to submit a special imagery request by clicking the link in today’s USGS story.

Don’t forget the flowers this Mother’s Day 💐

This American pika may look like it’s carrying a bouquet, but it’s actually gathering plants for its winter food stash in the mountains.

Pikas spend the warmer months collecting grasses, wildflowers, and other vegetation to store for the colder season ahead. Like moms everywhere, always gathering, planning ahead, and making sure everyone has what they need.

Happy Mother’s Day from the USGS!

📸: American pika eating plants. Credit: USGS

Amphibian Week is here! 🐸

Frogs, toads, salamanders, and caecilians have been around for hundreds of millions of years, quietly going about their lives in wetlands, forests, and streams across the globe. Amphibians are considered good indicators of general ecosystem health because of their close association with various aquatic habitats and sensitivity to different environmental stresses.

Amphibian populations are in serious decline, however, and amphibians are at greater risk than fishes, reptiles, birds, and mammals. To address these issues, the USGS Amphibian Research and Monitoring Initiative (ARMI) conducts research to support the needs of management agencies in the U.S.

Want to learn more and see more this week? Head over to @USGS_Wild for all the Amphibian Week content, including species spotlights, research highlights, and a few faces only a scientist could love.

📸1: Rough-skinned Newt
📸2: Plains Spadefoot
📸3: Mole Salamander

Credit: USGS

#AmphibianWeek

Amphibian Week is here! 🐸

Frogs, toads, salamanders, and caecilians have been around for hundreds of millions of years, quietly going about their lives in wetlands, forests, and streams across the globe. Amphibians are considered good indicators of general ecosystem health because of their close association with various aquatic habitats and sensitivity to different environmental stresses.

Amphibian populations are in serious decline, however, and amphibians are at greater risk than fishes, reptiles, birds, and mammals. To address these issues, the USGS Amphibian Research and Monitoring Initiative (ARMI) conducts research to support the needs of management agencies in the U.S.

Want to learn more and see more this week? Head over to @USGS_Wild for all the Amphibian Week content, including species spotlights, research highlights, and a few faces only a scientist could love.

📸1: Rough-skinned Newt
📸2: Plains Spadefoot
📸3: Mole Salamander

Credit: USGS

#AmphibianWeek

Amphibian Week is here! 🐸

Frogs, toads, salamanders, and caecilians have been around for hundreds of millions of years, quietly going about their lives in wetlands, forests, and streams across the globe. Amphibians are considered good indicators of general ecosystem health because of their close association with various aquatic habitats and sensitivity to different environmental stresses.

Amphibian populations are in serious decline, however, and amphibians are at greater risk than fishes, reptiles, birds, and mammals. To address these issues, the USGS Amphibian Research and Monitoring Initiative (ARMI) conducts research to support the needs of management agencies in the U.S.

Want to learn more and see more this week? Head over to @USGS_Wild for all the Amphibian Week content, including species spotlights, research highlights, and a few faces only a scientist could love.

📸1: Rough-skinned Newt
📸2: Plains Spadefoot
📸3: Mole Salamander

Credit: USGS

#AmphibianWeek

May the 4th Be with You!

It's not just science fiction, Planetary Defense at USGS is an active body of research, and protecting life and property is a core part of our mission at the Department of the Interior.

USGS Astrogeology has been researching hazards from space since the 1960s, and although we're not battling Star Destroyers, we'll do our best to inform you of rocky space invaders!

🎥: USGS Physical Scientist Dr. Lori Pigue explains past asteroid impacts and how the USGS is working to better understand potential hazards.

#PlanetaryDefense #StarWarsDay #PlanetaryDefenders

Did you hear that???

Well, Roaring Mountain isn’t quite as loud as it used to be, but it’s still one of the hottest thermal areas in all of Yellowstone National Park!

**Yellowstone Volcano Observatory monthly video update – May 1, 2026**

Roaring Mountain is located along the highway between Mammoth Hot Springs and Norris Geyser Basin. In the late 1800s, the sounds of gas escaping could be heard for miles, but that diminished by the beginning of the 1900s. Then, in 1902, there was a thermal event that brought the sound back once again! Heat emissions increased, and trees died off over a broad part of the thermal region.

Now, Roaring Mountain sort of hisses away, but that sound can be clearly heard when traffic and winds are light.

In addition to being the site of present-day thermal activity, the area near Roaring Mountain hosts a few hydrothermal explosion craters, including Semi-Centennial—a feature that erupted explosively, sending hot water and debris up to 300 feet (91 meters) high multiple times on August 14, 1922, but that has been quiet ever since On the high plateau just east of Roaring Mountain are a few more craters, the largest of which is about 850 feet (260 meters) across and spread ashy debris to a distance of up to 0.5 mile (800 meters).

During April 2026, the University of Utah Seismograph Stations, which monitors and operates the Yellowstone seismic network, located 97 earthquakes. The largest was a Magnitude 2.5. Deformation measurements indicate a pause in uplift along the north caldera rim and no net deformation of the caldera. Steamboat Geyser did not erupt in April, but nearby Echinus Geyser, which began erupting again in February after several years of quiet, erupted 4 times. Acoustic, seismic, camera, and temperature measurements detected eruptions at Black Diamond Pool in Biscuit Basin on April 28 and 29, the latter of which is the largest recorded since instrumental monitoring began in the basin in summer 2025.

It’s like writing a message in the sand but way, way bigger.

These satellite images show features on our planet that resemble letters of the English alphabet. The images were captured by the @nasa @usgs Landsat satellites, which have been collecting valuable scientific data about Earth for over 50 years.

What will you spell with Earth at your fingertips? Tell us in the comments.

Image description:
Image that spells out “hello world” using satellite images of Earth. Each image shows a mountain range, lake, island, river, or other feature that resembles a letter of the English alphabet. Credit: NASA

#NASA #Earth #Science #Landsat

Volume up!The sights and sounds of Black Diamond Pool in Yellowstone National Park are pretty impressive.

This pool, located in Biscuit Basin, was the site of a hydrothermal explosion on July 23, 2024, that destroyed a boardwalk and sent visitors running for safety (fortunately, there were no injuries).

Ever since that explosion, sporadic eruptions have hurled muddy water up to tens of feet (several meters) into the air.

🎥: This most recent eruption occurred on Tuesday, April 28, at 10:49 AM. There have been three additional such eruptions so far this year, but this is the first that occurred during daylight and when the camera was not covered in ice.

📸: Remote camera that maintains a view of Black Diamond Pool in Biscuit Basin. Since that time, the camera and other nearby monitoring instruments have detected numerous smaller muddy eruptions from the pool.

Volume up!The sights and sounds of Black Diamond Pool in Yellowstone National Park are pretty impressive.

This pool, located in Biscuit Basin, was the site of a hydrothermal explosion on July 23, 2024, that destroyed a boardwalk and sent visitors running for safety (fortunately, there were no injuries).

Ever since that explosion, sporadic eruptions have hurled muddy water up to tens of feet (several meters) into the air.

🎥: This most recent eruption occurred on Tuesday, April 28, at 10:49 AM. There have been three additional such eruptions so far this year, but this is the first that occurred during daylight and when the camera was not covered in ice.

📸: Remote camera that maintains a view of Black Diamond Pool in Biscuit Basin. Since that time, the camera and other nearby monitoring instruments have detected numerous smaller muddy eruptions from the pool.

New Nationwide Tool Helps Answer: Do We Have Enough Water?

We released the first nationwide tool to help water planners determine if communities have enough water for current and future needs.

Nearly 27 million Americans, or 8% of the U.S. population, live in areas where water demand consistently approaches or exceeds naturally available water supply. Until now, accessing comprehensive water availability information required navigating fragmented datasets across multiple agencies. The new tool eliminates many of those barriers.

The USGS National Water Availability Assessment Data Companion provides water managers, agricultural communities, and researchers with detailed information about water supply and demand across approximately 80,000 watersheds nationwide.

Users can explore conditions for any watershed, compare regions, identify seasonal patterns and download complete datasets in multiple formats for custom analysis. Technical users can access data through web services and integrate this information into modeling workflows.

Access the Data Companion at the link in our story.

📷: Farmer walking through crop field under center pivot irrigation system. Water use data, including crop irrigation, are available on the Data Companion!

#WaterData #WaterAvailability #DataCompanion

From 1,400 books to one of the world’s largest Earth science collections 📚🌎

When the USGS was established in 1879, the library started with just 1,400 books—supporting early efforts to explore and understand the nation’s landscapes.

Today, it has grown into one of the most comprehensive Earth science collections in the world:

📖 1.5 million volumes
🗺️ 750,000 maps
📷 500,000 historical photos
📝 30,000 field records

Whether you’re tracing the history of a volcanic eruption, studying water resources, or exploring decades of fieldwork, the USGS library has resources that can help.

During National Library Week, we recognize the USGS Library and libraries everywhere for preserving knowledge, supporting discovery, and connecting generations of science.

Explore the collections at the link in today's story.

📷1: USGS library reading room in the Interior Building, Washington, D.C. 1935.
📷2: USGS library in the Hooe Building, Washington, D.C. 1917.
📷3: USGS library display of the world-famous George Frederick Kunz library of gems and precious stones. Washington, D.C. 1935.

#NationalLibraryWeek

From 1,400 books to one of the world’s largest Earth science collections 📚🌎

When the USGS was established in 1879, the library started with just 1,400 books—supporting early efforts to explore and understand the nation’s landscapes.

Today, it has grown into one of the most comprehensive Earth science collections in the world:

📖 1.5 million volumes
🗺️ 750,000 maps
📷 500,000 historical photos
📝 30,000 field records

Whether you’re tracing the history of a volcanic eruption, studying water resources, or exploring decades of fieldwork, the USGS library has resources that can help.

During National Library Week, we recognize the USGS Library and libraries everywhere for preserving knowledge, supporting discovery, and connecting generations of science.

Explore the collections at the link in today's story.

📷1: USGS library reading room in the Interior Building, Washington, D.C. 1935.
📷2: USGS library in the Hooe Building, Washington, D.C. 1917.
📷3: USGS library display of the world-famous George Frederick Kunz library of gems and precious stones. Washington, D.C. 1935.

#NationalLibraryWeek

From 1,400 books to one of the world’s largest Earth science collections 📚🌎

When the USGS was established in 1879, the library started with just 1,400 books—supporting early efforts to explore and understand the nation’s landscapes.

Today, it has grown into one of the most comprehensive Earth science collections in the world:

📖 1.5 million volumes
🗺️ 750,000 maps
📷 500,000 historical photos
📝 30,000 field records

Whether you’re tracing the history of a volcanic eruption, studying water resources, or exploring decades of fieldwork, the USGS library has resources that can help.

During National Library Week, we recognize the USGS Library and libraries everywhere for preserving knowledge, supporting discovery, and connecting generations of science.

Explore the collections at the link in today's story.

📷1: USGS library reading room in the Interior Building, Washington, D.C. 1935.
📷2: USGS library in the Hooe Building, Washington, D.C. 1917.
📷3: USGS library display of the world-famous George Frederick Kunz library of gems and precious stones. Washington, D.C. 1935.

#NationalLibraryWeek