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Natural Resources Canada > Earth Sciences Sector > Priorities > Canada Centre for Remote Sensing
Tour Canada from space Resolute, Nunavut
 While Grise Fiord is the northernmost community in Nunavut, the hamlet of Resolute is the second. Situated on the south coast of Cornwallis Island, in the Queen Elizabeth Islands, Resolute takes its name from the ship - HMS Resolute, one of the vessels that came in search of the lost British expedition under Sir John Franklin.
Since the middle of the 20th century, it has been a scientific research station and jumping-off point for explorations to the north pole and the magnetic north pole. More and more tourists now visit Resolute, attracted by the "land of the midnight sun" and its denizens. In this airborne radar image, the settlement can be seen nestled below "Signal Hill", close to Resolute Bay. A storage tank farm and various communication towers cluster between Resolute Bay and Resolute Lake. The most prominent feature in this image is the airport with its runways in a dog-leg shape.
Question: What's the bright stuff in the ocean? Why isn't it waves? [ Answer ]
About this Image
| Location: |
Resolute, Nunavut |
| NTS map(s): |
58 F |
 Location Map: |
See a detailed map (1:1M) of the region |
| Image Date: |
April 30, 1993, 21:00 GMT |
| Satellites/Sensors: |
CCRS Convair 580 with C/X SAR |
| Resolution: |
6 m pixels |
| Image Area: |
4.8 x 4.8 km |
| Image Features: |
Town, airport, runways, hillside, ponds, navigation beacon, ice, storage tanks, open water |
| Related Tour Images: |
Rankin Inlet, Nunavut; Bathurst Island, Nunavut |
| Related Glossary Terms: |
These terms from the CCRS Glossary may help you to understand this image and its interpretation:
Backscatter, diffuse reflection, specular reflection, corner reflector, SAR, coherent radiation, speckle |
| Related Tutorial Sections: |
These sections of the "Fundamentals of Remote Sensing" tutorial by CCRS will help you to better understand this image and its interpretation:
3.2 3.5 3.6 3.8
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| Image Credits: |
Imagery collected, processed and analyzed by the Canada Centre for Remote Sensing
Ground photos by Paul Budkewitsch, CCRS |
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Additional
Information: | This airborne radar image was acquired at an altitude of approximately 6,000 metres by CCRS. It was collected in support of sea ice studies (ice signatures and interferometry for mapping ice roughness) as part of the SIMMS'93 experiment.
On the right side of the image, the striations are indicative of rock layering. The dark and light tones evident on the ground surface represent the alternation between coarse and fine materials. The coarse materials (limestone), about 2 to 5 cm granularity, better backscatter the (approx.) 3 cm wavelength of the X-band radar energy and thus appear brighter. The fine materials (lime carbonate or mudstone), about 1 cm granularity, appears much smoother to the incoming radar beams and tend to be scattered away from the radar antenna and thus appear darker.
At the top left of the image, the ground slopes gently to the sea. Raised beaches from previous sealevel highs are evident, much like contour lines. These gravel deposits are caused by past storm events. The dark blotches are very shallow puddles, also conforming to the subtle topography of the beach ridges. |
| Question: |
What's the bright stuff in the ocean? Why isn't it waves? |
| Answer: |
At the end of April, the ocean surface in the vicinity of Resolute is still covered by ice. The brighter patches are due to a coarser ice surface, which may be due to a variety of reasons - multi-year ice, freezing/melting of the surface ice and snow, wind effects on the snow, etc. Waves, of course, wouldn't be evident with an ice cover. Even without knowing that, there is no regularity and repetitiveness to the pattern, which is what you would expect to see with ocean waves. |
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