{"id":218,"date":"2012-04-26T17:16:22","date_gmt":"2012-04-26T23:16:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rammb.cira.colostate.edu\/projects\/npp\/blog\/?p=218"},"modified":"2026-03-06T18:03:02","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T18:03:02","slug":"remote-islands-part-i-easter-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/2012\/04\/26\/remote-islands-part-i-easter-island\/","title":{"rendered":"Remote Islands, part I: Easter Island"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>With the I-bands having ~375 m resolution at nadir, VIIRS is a powerful instrument. We have already seen the detailed imagery it produces of <a href=\"https:\/\/rammb.cira.colostate.edu\/projects\/npp\/blog\/index.php\/uncategorized\/viirs-view-of-march-2-tornadic-storms\/\">severe thunderstorms<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/rammb.cira.colostate.edu\/projects\/npp\/blog\/index.php\/uncategorized\/tropical-cyclone-giovanna\/\">tropical cyclones<\/a>. But, you might ask (particularly if you&#8217;re thinking you need a vacation), what remote islands is it able to see?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, it can see Easter Island. Yes, <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Easter_Island\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the one with all the big-headed statues<\/a> (moai).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/rammb.cira.colostate.edu\/projects\/npp\/blog\/index.php\/uncategorized\/remote-islands-part-i-easter-island\/attachment\/easter_island_20120426_2044_svi_rgbc\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-219\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1005\" height=\"782\" src=\"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/jpss-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2012\/04\/easter_island_20120426_2044_SVI_RGBc.png\" alt=\"False color RGB composite (I1-I2-I3) image of Easter Island, 20:44 UTC 25 April 2012\" class=\"wp-image-219\" srcset=\"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2012\/04\/easter_island_20120426_2044_SVI_RGBc.png 1005w, https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2012\/04\/easter_island_20120426_2044_SVI_RGBc-300x233.png 300w, https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2012\/04\/easter_island_20120426_2044_SVI_RGBc-768x598.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1005px) 100vw, 1005px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>At approximately 24.6 km x 12.3 km, VIIRS has no problem identifying the triangular island, as this false color (I1-I2-I3) RGB composite shows. In this image, taken at 20:44 UTC on 25 April 2012, the 163 km<sup>2<\/sup> island appears to be dwarfed by a thunderstorm just to its north.&nbsp; If you zoom in, you can see several small cumulus clouds over the island along with their shadows. Unfortunately, it is not quite the resolution needed to see the individual moai.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As Easter Island is in the southern hemisphere, it is autumn there now. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.weatherbase.com\/weather\/weather.php3?s=096458&amp;refer=&amp;units=us\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The average high temperature is down to 76 \u00b0F (from a summertime peak of 79 \u00b0F in February)<\/a>. April and May are listed as the wettest months, so an image of Easter Island not obscured by clouds this time of year may be a rare occurrence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With the I-bands having ~375 m resolution at nadir, VIIRS is a powerful instrument. We have already seen the detailed imagery it produces of severe thunderstorms and tropical cyclones. But, you might ask (particularly if you&#8217;re thinking you need a vacation), what remote islands is it able to see? Well, it can see Easter Island. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[50,154,155,156,187,195],"class_list":["post-218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-false-color","tag-remote-island","tag-resolution","tag-rgb-composite","tag-thunderstorm","tag-viirs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4478,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218\/revisions\/4478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/npp-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}