Winterscape , Liaoning Coast, China
19 January 2004

Note: The area of coverage in this SPOT-5 image is approximately 20 km x 20 km.
The reduced resolution image on display has undergone compression and so does not represent the true resolution of the original satellite image.

The January image of northeast China shows a brown, bare, cold landscape with frozen rivers and sea ice. Ice packs have started to accumulate in the sheltered waters of the Liaodong Bay several kilometres offshore, with individual units reaching up to 5km in length. The coast is also frozen, with ice forming immediately behind the beach and over the ponds in the fish farms. The rivers have stopped flowing, being partially transformed into a linear pattern of frozen alluvium interspersed with ice, where pools of water have frozen. Several nucleated settlements and roads and a railway line are also in the image.