By Adam Voiland, NASA Earth Observatory
January 16, 2022
For comparison, the second image reveals the same location on December 14, 2021, before the storms struck. The images are false-color, utilizing a combination of shortwave and visible infrared light (bands 7-2-1) to make it much easier to identify between land and water. The current burst of rain will not always end Irans dry spell or water challenges instantly.
December 14, 2021
January 7, 2022
After months of extreme drought, a burst of rain is triggering problems.
For much of 2021, drought grasped southern Iran, parching crops, drying wells, and fueling protests over water. The very first week of 2022 brought the opposite issue– a series of powerful rain and snow storms overwhelmed rivers and released extensive flooding.
For contrast, the 2nd image shows the very same area on December 14, 2021, before the storms struck. The images are false-color, utilizing a combination of noticeable and shortwave infrared light (bands 7-2-1) to make it much easier to identify between land and water.
January 7, 2022.
News and social networks reports showed harmful flood waters that rinsed bridges, swept away vehicles, swamped homes, and swamped farmland. The floods have killed at least 10 people and harmed hundreds of lorries and homes, according to the Iranian Red Crescent Society.
The recent burst of rain will not necessarily end Irans dry spell or water difficulties immediately. While storms can replenish moisture on the surface, it takes a sustained period of wet weather to renew groundwater, which lots of individuals in this area count on for irrigation. Information gathered by the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO) satellites show that reserves of shallow groundwater in the regions aquifers, though improved, were still low in some parts of southern Iran on January 10, 2021, according to GRACE-FO information released by the University of Nebraska.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS information from NASA EOSDIS LANCE and GIBS/Worldview.