CHRIS captures images of Hungarian toxic sludge
Friday, October 22. 2010
The Compact High Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (CHRIS) recently captured telling images of red toxic sludge following the Ajka alumina plant accident in Devecser, Hungary that has recently been widely reported in the media. Unlike many satellite images of flooding disasters, there is no need to highlight the affected area in the image afterwards as the red sludge clearly stands out from the surrounding landscape.
Toxic sludge in Devecser, Hungary. Copyright ESA, CHRIS Imager, processed by DMCii
Emergency monitoring is just one of the applications that the high-resolution CHRIS imager has been used for during the past 9 years. In fact, today marks the 9th birthday of the CHRIS imager which was launched on-board the European Space Agency’s PROBA-1 mission in October 2001. The hyperspectral data from CHRIS remains in high demand from the international scientific community and its rich, high-resolution imagery is used for precision farming, air quality assessment and seabed classification and much, much more.
The image above was acquired on October 14th, showing the extent of the disaster in great detail. Not bad for a nine year old!
The toxic sludge spill followed a collapsed reservoir on October 4 and initially affected about 40 square kilometres of land. Read more about the accident on BBC’s website.
