Photo #: ISS061-E-6914 Date: Oct. 2019 Geographic Region: IRAN Feature: CASPIAN SEA, MIAN KALEH, BANDAR GAZ |
An astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) took this photograph highlighting the water surface in the southeast corner of the Caspian Sea. The tight angle of the coastline, close to the point where Iran and Turkmenistan meet, is a readily recognizable landmark for ISS crews. The region has a generally arid climate, but thick forests blanket the rain-catching slopes of the Elburz Mountains that fringe the sea. The image shows patterns of swirls on the sea surface as revealed by reflected sunlight, or sunglint. This circulation has been studied through both remote sensing and in situ techniques-in this case floating drifters that take direct measurements in the water column as their movements are tracked by GPS. Thanks to such data, scientists now know that the water in this corner of the Caspian Sea circulates slowly in a counterclockwise direction, making a broad current pattern termed a gyre. This flow appears to astronauts as a complicated pattern of smaller eddies or swirls; they are larger where the water is deeper (top center) and much smaller near the shoreline, where the water is shallower. |
Images: | All Available Images Low-Resolution 376k |
|
Mission: | ISS061 |
|
Roll - Frame: | E - 6914 |
|
Geographical Name: | IRAN |
|
Features: | CASPIAN SEA, MIAN KALEH, BANDAR GAZ |
|
Center Lat x Lon: | 37.0N x 53.8E |
|
Film Exposure: | N=Normal exposure, U=Under exposed, O=Over exposed, F=out of Focus |
|
Percentage of Cloud Cover-CLDP: | 10 |
|
Camera:: | N8 |
|
Camera Tilt: | HO | LO=Low Oblique, HO=High Oblique, NV=Near Vertical |
Camera Focal Length: | 240 |
|
Nadir to Photo Center Direction: | E | The direction from the nadir to the center point, N=North, S=South, E=East, W=West |
Stereo?: | Y=Yes there is an adjacent picture of the same area, N=No there isn't |
|
Orbit Number: | |
|
Date: | 20191018 | YYYYMMDD |
Time: | 045721 | GMT HHMMSS |
Nadir Lat: | 37.8N |
Latitude of suborbital point of spacecraft |
Nadir Lon: | 48.1E |
Longitude of suborbital point of spacecraft |
Sun Azimuth: | 121 | Clockwise angle in degrees from north to the sun measured at the nadir point |
Space Craft Altitude: | 223 | nautical miles |
Sun Elevation: | 21 | Angle in degrees between the horizon and the sun, measured at the nadir point |
Land Views: | |
|
Water Views: | |
|
Atmosphere Views: | |
|
Man Made Views: | |
|
City Views: | |
|
Photo is not associated with any sequences |
NASA Home Page |
JSC Home Page |
JSC Digital Image Collection |
Earth Science & Remote Sensing |
|