October 8, 2021 - Lake Maracaibo

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Lake Maracaibo
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It was once a source of great abundance—particularly fossil fuels and
fish—for the people of Venezuela. Now Lake Maracaibo is mostly abundant
with pollution from leaking oil and excess nutrients.

Spanning 13,000 square kilometers (5,000 square miles) in northwestern
Venezuela, Lake Maracaibo is one of South America’s largest lakes and
one of the oldest in the world. Though it was filled with freshwater
thousands of years ago, Maracaibo is now an estuarine lake connected to
the Gulf of Venezuela and the Caribbean Sea by a narrow strait. That
strait was significantly expanded in the 1930–50s by dredging for ship
traffic. Now the north end of the lake is brackish, while the south end
is mostly fresh due to abundant flows from nearby rivers.

On October 1, 2021, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer
(MODIS) on board NASA’s Terra satellite acquired a true-color image
showing Lake Maracaibo filled with swirls of green, tan, and gray. The
sources of these colors were algae, river sediment outflows, and crude
oil leaks. The swirls were created as they were carried by the flow of
currents and eddies in the lake.

One of the largest known oil and gas reserves in the world sits beneath
Lake Maracaibo. Thousands of wells have been drilled into the lake
since World War I, first by foreign companies and then by Venezuela’s
state-run oil company. About two-thirds of the oil produced by the
country comes from this region.

But the fuel that once made Maracaibo prosperous is now endangering
wildlife, water quality, and human health. According to many news and
scientific reports, the region’s oil-extraction and delivery
infrastructure is in serious disrepair. Slicks have been a regular
occurrence on the lake for many years, and crude oil often washes up on
the shores.

According to reports from news agencies, environmental groups, and
human rights advocates, as many as 40,000 to 50,000 oil leaks and
spills occurred between 2010 and 2016 across Venezuela, including Lake
Maracaibo. Thousands of oil derricks and thousands of miles of
pipelines are decaying or leaking due to a reported lack of capital to
repair them. Local fishermen often find their nets and their catch
soaked in crude.

The widespread greenery in the water is another sign of distress.
Because the lake is overloaded with nutrients, plants such as duckweed
(Lemna obscura ) and green algae (such as Scenedesmus and Chlorella)
bloom in great abundance. They have become a permanent feature in the
lake, with the amount dependent on the seasonal cycles.

Image Facts
Satellite: Terra
Date Acquired: 10/1/2021
Resolutions: 1km (238.3 KB), 500m (596.3 KB), 250m (433.6
KB)
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit: MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC



https://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2021-10-08

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