Nature: The European Space Agency’s Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity ( SMOS) spacecraft has released its first map of Earth’s soil moisture. Launched in November 2009, SMOS derives soil moisture by measuring and analyzing the microwave spectrum emitted by the ground. In the map shown below, blue connotes dry soil; red connotes wet soil. The map was taken on 21 June, when the US midwest was unusually wet and the UK southeast was unusually dry.
