Soil humidity below average in much of south-western Europe, which leaves behind a particularly dry winter as well as the second warmest on record: northern Italy is among the most affected areas, together with France, Spain and Great Britain Brittany, as demonstrated by the maps created thanks to the data collected by the Smos satellite (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity), developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) for the analysis of ocean salinity and soil humidity.
The images compare the situation recorded in the first three months of 2022 and that of this year: the water-green spots that indicated the presence of humidity have given way to brown that signals the aridity of the soil. In many areas of Western Europe the soil humidity is 4% lower than the average, while in some areas of Spain and Turkey it is even as low as 8%.
Thanks to an innovative interferometric radiometer, the Smos satellite (launched in 2009) makes it possible to obtain a global map of soil moisture every three days, with an accuracy of 4% at a spatial resolution of approximately 50 kilometres. “It’s like detecting a teaspoon of water mixed in a handful of soil”, explain the ESA experts.
Source: Ansa
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