The Earth as you’ve never seen it!

Since 1970, every April 22, we celebrate “the Earth”. This planet on which we are born, we live, we grow up, we die. But why ? Originally, this day was created to encourage citizens to take action in favor of the blue planet, often through everyday gestures to adapt, ecological associations to join… This year, Futura offers you a dozen unusual views of Earth.

What are these colored dots?

Taken by Thomas Pésquet during his last stay on the ISS, all these patterns that appear to be dots are actually… dunes! More specifically, the dunes of the Sahara, this desert in northern Africa which extends over no less than 9 million km² and crosses ten states.

And a closer look…

Madagascar from the sky

We can say thank you to Thomas Pesquet for his eye advised and his photos resplendent! Since the international space stationhe captures with a new perspective these amazing places. Here, Madagascar seen from the sky, more particularly the Betsiboka, a river located in the north of the Island, resumes colors cold when flowing into Bombetoka Bay. Its orange color is due to the presence of sediment which are deposited in the river as it roams the mountains and cliffs.

And a closer look…

As with many places, if from a distance the colors seem breathtaking, up close the reality is quite different. As a reminder, each French person produces more than half a ton of waste per year. Specifically these are 590 kilograms of waste produced per French person each year. What make you dizzy if you multiply this quantity by the more than 65 million French people that we are.

The mysterious geoglyphs of Nazca, traces of an ancient civilization

Again a view from the ISS… difficult to say if we are on Earth, as this place seems so strange!

And seen a little closer… the patterns appear!

Indonesia, as beautiful as it is damaged

With its 18,000 islands and almost 2 million km² in area, Indonesia has more than 300 different ethnic groups, each inhabited island having developed its own culture. Here, a astronaut from the ISS (not Thomas Pesquet this time) captured the Mount Sundoro and Mount Sumbing volcanoes, two neighbors on the island of Java, which is home to the current capital of the country, Jakarta. The whitened areas at the bases of the volcanoes correspond to areas of intensive agriculture, while the dark green areas are places left untouched.

Take a closer look…

On the island of Bali, east of Java, tourism is flourishing. Turquoise beaches, transparent water, deep green rice fields, mountains and volcanoes to climb, it’s all there! But the underside of these heavenly places is quite sad. It is a known fact, we consume too much plastic. But if a part is taken care of, whether it is recycled or burned, the majority is left abandoned, or very often thrown into the ocean. Who has never seen these photos of turtles with your head stuck in a plastic bag, or in a can wrapper? The currents sometimes bring this plastic waste back to shore, or to what is called the seventh continentgradually destroying fire the biodiversity.

Human activity has amazing consequences

Seen from the sky, human activity seems to illuminate our planet. Here, apart from lightning visible on the right, Thomas Pesquet photographed asia by nightwhere all these small luminous points to the left of the flashes correspond to boats of sin. In particular, the green dots would be ship lights that use this color to fish the squid !

And day view, another amazing consequence of human activity… Glass Beach, in Fort Bragg, California! This town takes its name from glasses of sea that fill it. Created by decades of dumping rubbish in the coastal area north of the city, they were polished and then spat out by the sea, taking on the appearance of pebbles transparent or colored.

But this beach has a duration limited. As tourism is widespread there, the glasses are gradually disappearing, taken away as souvenirs by passing tourists. A rather special form of cleaning.