February 3, 2021 - Simpson Desert, Australia

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   Simpson Desert
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   Australia’s Simpson Desert has been called “the ultimate social
   distance”—a sprawling region of dunes and sand transected by only by a
   few four-wheel drive tracks. This remote location in central Australia
   is the perfect place to get away from people—if you can survive the
   heat and lack of water.

   The Simpson Desert stretches over roughly 143,000 square kilometers
   (55,000 square miles) of the southeastern corner of the Northern
   Territory, southeastern Queensland, and northern South Australia. The
   Earth’s longest parallel sand dunes run diagonally through part of the
   desert. Oriented northwest to southeast, they were sculpted by
   prevailing winds from the southeast over eons. Many are stabilized by
   roots of drought-resistant plants that survive in the dry, hot sand.
   Dunes rise between 10-40 meters (33-130 feet) and extend from one to
   several hundred kilometers (one-half to hundreds of miles) long.
   Estimation of the age of the dunes by isotope dating shows the
   dunefield formed in the Early Pleistocene era, roughly 1 million years
   ago.

   The primary colors of the Simpson Desert range from orange-red to
   yellowish-tan. In the yellow-toned southeast, sand is fine to medium
   grain and contains abundant zircon, ilmenite, and garnet with minor
   amounts of iron oxides. These and other physical characteristics
   suggest that the sand in this area was derived from floodplains of
   rivers and salt lake systems. In contrast, the red tones found in the
   north and western regions come from medium-grained sands rich in iron
   oxides and kaolinite, suggesting that these grains came from weathering
   and erosion of sediments lying deep underneath the surface. Studies of
   sand in the Simpson Desert also show that sand has been frequently
   washed into some areas by waters flowing in ancient rivers and spilling
   across the desert.

   The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard NASA’s
   Terra satellite acquired a true-color image of the Simpson Desert on
   January 31, 2021. The color transition from rusty-red to
   tan-tinted-gold paints a stunning portrait of a summer day in the
   Simpson. The parallel lines of the tall dunes can most easily be seen
   in the south and east.

   Image Facts
   Satellite:  Terra
   Date Acquired: 1/31/2021
   Resolutions:  1km (22.6 KB),  500m (79.1 KB),  250m (233.2 KB)
   Bands Used: 1,4,3
   Image Credit: MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC



https://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2021-02-03
 
