Images

An oblique aerial photograph shows the currently active Long Range Radar Site on Barter Island, formerly a DEW Line (Distant Early Warning) station that was deactivated in 1990. The Cold War-era landfill in the foreground of the photograph was at immediate risk from coastal erosion in 2006 and has since been relocated farther inland.

This oblique aerial photograph is of Flaxman Island off the Alaska coast and shows a tapped thermokarst lakes, caribou tracks and ice-rich bluffs that are eroding.

This photograph shows ice-wedge polygons and an eroding shoreline at Cape Halkett on the Beaufort Sea coast of Alaska. Coastal erosion along the Arctic coast is chronic, widespread and potentially accelerating, posing threats to infrastructure important for defense and energy purposes, natural shoreline habitats and nearby Native communities.

This photograph shows the Arctic Coastal Plain of northern Alaska. Coastal erosion along the Arctic coast is chronic, widespread and potentially accelerating, posing threats to infrastructure important for defense and energy purposes, natural shoreline habitats and nearby Native communities.

This photograph shows caribou tracks on ice-wedge polygons near Garry Creek in Alaska. Coastal erosion along the Arctic coast is chronic, widespread and potentially accelerating, posing threats to infrastructure important for defense and energy purposes, natural shoreline habitats and nearby Native communities.

A polar bear stands on a low-lying barrier shoal near the Huluhula River on the Beaufort Sea coast of Alaska. Coastal erosion along the Arctic coast is chronic, widespread and potentially accelerating, posing threats to infrastructure important for defense and energy purposes, natural shoreline habitats and nearby Native communities.

Photograph of barrier islands near the western terminus of Icy Reef located on the Beaufort Sea coast of Alaska, looking south. Egaksrak Lagoon separates the islands from the low-lying mainland coast of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Brooks Range in the background.

This photograph shows ice-wedge polygons and an eroding shoreline at Cape Halkett on the Beaufort Sea coast of Alaska. Coastal erosion along the Arctic coast is chronic, widespread, and potentially accelerating, posing threats to infrastructure important for defense and energy purposes, natural shoreline habitats, and nearby Native communities.

Coral atolls are normally long, thin bars of white sand that rise just a few meters above sea level. The island or island group surrounds a hollow center where a volcanic peak once was. The atoll shown in this photo-like satellite image is the island of Tureia, in French Polynesia, in the South Pacific Ocean.

Landsat image of Maui, Hawaiʻi, with the small island of Kahoʻolawe to its south.

USGS scientists Andrew Schwartz and Dan Hanes maneuver a current profiler for a study of surf-zone hydrodynamics at Ocean Beach, on the west side of San Francisco, California. Beach erosion has been a continuing problem in this area.

Sonar-generated image showing underwater topography and the potential for landslides near the head of Resurrection Bay, Alaska. The terrain looks three times as steep as it occurs naturally. The arrow points to underwater landslide debris from the collapse of a fan-delta following the great Alaskan earthquake of 1964.

Large-scale poster describing USGS work.

The USGS, in cooperation with the Upper Yuba River Studies Program and the California Bay–Delta Authority (CALFED), studied Englebright Lake. Englebright Dam was built in 1941 to trap sediment washed downstream by hydraulic gold mining.

Large-scale poster describing USGS work.

USGS scientists needed a better way to measure river sand in the Grand Canyon. Traditionally, scientists used a bucket to get about 75 sand samples on each trip, which were analyzed weeks later in a lab.

Shaded relief image of Nahant to Gloucester, MA

Dauphin Island, Alabama. Map views of post-storm difference grids for Hurricanes Ivan (A) and Katrina (B), and vertical photography of the same location (C). The lidar images show elevation gains (green) and losses (red).

Dauphin Island, Alabama. Three-dimensional views of island topography (A-C), post-Katrina oblique aerial photograph (D), and differences in topography from Hurricanes Ivan (E) and Katrina (F). The view is along the island, looking from east to west, with the Gulf of Mexico to the left and Mississippi Sound to the right.

The top image was taken off the coast of Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, in July 1998 by researchers at the University of New Orleans. In this image, notice the large multi-story houses, some of which are built on stilts to protect the homes from flooding. The bottom image shows the same location on August 31, 2005, two days after landfall of Hurricane Katrina.

Large-scale poster describing USGS work.

Tsunami wave field in the Bay of Bengal one hour after the M=9.1 Sumatra-Andaman earthquake on December 26, 2004. View looks to the northwest.

A field of giant sand waves, among the largest in the world, at the mouth of San Francisco Bay in California.