Earth Observation (EO)

Copernicus Satellites & Cloudferro

Agan River & Wetlands (central Russia)

Once a year Mom's brother would visit. An attorney, he'd nag me about going to college. He allowed as how it wouldn't make me any smarter, but it'd open doors.

When, at the tender age of 33, I got bored with my thoughts, I decided to go see.

I didn't have a job in mind so took courses of interest: geology, economics, statistics, anthropology, journalism. When it came time to declare a major, they fit under the umbrella of Geography.

I specialized in Remote Sensing. In those days there were only a few satellites and what few jobs there were went to better students.

I ended up where I needed to be but now, decades on, when I chanced upon mention of the Copernicus programme, a European-funded satellite-based effort at monitoring changes on the planet whose images are open to the public, I went to see what I might've done instead.

My interest in art over-rode my technical curiosity so when I saw the contest for best image (Agan River & Wetlands - at top), I pivoted.

About the contest...

https://cloudferro.com/contest2024/

From Cloudferro website link above

This year we were looking for the most outstanding imagery showing places worth preserving and saving from the effects of environmental changes. The images were generated on such EO platforms as Copernicus Data Space Ecosystem, CREODIAS, WEkEO, CODE-DE or EO-Lab. The winners were selected by internet users, who voted for the best 13 images, and then a Jury, who chose the top three entries that took the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place.

The Jury was composed of Simonetta Cheli, ESA, Stefano La Terra Bella, European Commission - DG DEFIS, Katrin Molch, German Aerospace Agency DLR, Danaele Puechmaille, EUMETSAT, prof. Grzegorz Wrochna, Polish Space Agency POLSA, Betty Charalampopoulou, EARSC, prof. Katarzyna Dąbrowska-Zielińska, Polish Institute of Geodesy and Cartography IGiK.

Here's the Copernicus article about the winning image...

https://dataspace.copernicus.eu/gallery/2024-5-21-agan-river-wetlands-wins-seize-beauty-our-planet