The last day of Summer…
AWIPS images of MODIS visible, snow/ice, and Land Suface Temperature
What do you do on the last day of meteorological summer if you’re in southeastern Nunavut or far northern Manitoba in Canada? You watch fresh snow cover melt! AWIPS images of the MODIS visible channel, snow/ice channel, and Land Surface Temperature product on 21 September 2008 (above) showed that significant snow cover was in place across that region (which had fallen a few days earlier). The many lakes in that area were still not frozen, and appeared very dark against the surrounding snow cover on the visible image. The slightly darker signal on the near-IR snow/ice image confirmed the presence of snow cover; Land Surface Temperature values were at or just below freezing at many locations (darker green colors), where presumably there was somewhat more snow cover.
The snow cover analysis from Environment Canada (below) indicated that as much as 12 cm (5 inches) of snow was on the ground in that region.
Snow cover analysis