Betsiboka River, Madagascar
Although PROBA-V was designed as a land surface research mission, several studies have indicated that its high-quality 100 m observations are beneficial for coastal turbidity monitoring.
Within the framework of the Advanced Land, Aerosol, and Coastal Products for PROBA-V (PV-LAC) and PROBA4COAST projects, a new version of iCOR was developed for application to PROBA-V observations and to generate coastal turbidity maps. These maps reveal more detailed spatial patterns of turbid waters at coasts and river estuaries compared to existing turbidity maps from typical Ocean Colour satellites.
R&D professional Water & Coast Els Knaeps explains more on coastal turbidity monitoring and the availability of PROBA-V coastal products in her latest blog
'A vegetation satellite for coastal turbidity monitoring'.
An example of turbid coastal waters can be seen in the 100 m image of 13 May 2017, which shows the Betsiboka delta in northwestern Madagascar. The river is about 525 km long and its delta is surrounded by mangroves. The greens taints clearly show the turbid waters from the river flowing northwards into Mozambique Channel.