Kamchatka Peninsula   02/19/08

This beautiful image of the snowy Kamchatka Peninsula, in Eastern Russia, was captured by the MODIS on the Aqua satellite on February 19, 2008. The peninsula is flanked by the Sea of Okhotskoy on the left and the Bering Sea on the right.

Kamchatka is mountainous and volcanically active. On the image, you can see the Sredinnyy Khrebet Mountains running down the center. Some of its numerous volcanoes are easily visible east of this central mountain range. The highest of them, Klyuchevskaya Sopka, is 15,584 feet tall. The Shiveluch volcano, the northernmost volcano in this grouping (near the center of the image) is one of the most active volcanoes on Kamchatka. Here is an image of it erupting last March.

Text and image courtesy of NASA's MODIS Land Rapid Response Team.