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Lewis
and Clark: Eyes in the Sky
Right
now, high up in the
sky, satellites are tracing the route that Lewis and Clark
took nearly 200 years ago. Thousands of images are being put
together as part of a larger project of studying the land,
vegetation, and geography of what Meriwether Lewis and
William Clark saw on their 3,700-mile journey from 1804 to
1806.
 It's
all part of the Earth Observing System Education Project, at
the University of Montana in Missoula, which is home to a
National Lewis and Clark Education Center. In preparation
for the historic expedition's bicentennial celebration,
which begins next year, programs like the EOSEP are
gathering data and comparing them to what Lewis and Clark
recorded. The goal: to see what's changed and by how
much.
This
time, however, modern technology is doing in months what it
took the Corps of Discovery years to accomplish. Aided by
the Global
Positioning System,
Terra and Landsat satellites are snapping pictures and
transmitting data all the time, and scientists and
historians hope to have animaled fly-throughs available
soon.
Some
progress has already been made. For instance, some areas
haven't changed all that much, according to project
scientists. In other areas, on the other hand, cities have
grown and with them, highways, pollution, and other
byproducts of population growth.
It's
all in the interest of geography, history, and ecology, and
it's happening right now, high above our heads.
Graphics
courtesy of Space.com
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Social Studies
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copyright 2002-9,
David White
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