Contact: Alan Buis
alan.d.buis@jpl.nasa.gov
818-354-0474
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

NASA's GRACE Sees Major Water Losses in Middle East

Caption: Variations in total water storage from normal, in millimeters, in the Tigris and Euphrates river basins, as measured by NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites, from January 2003 through December 2009. Reds represent drier conditions, while blues represent wetter conditions. The majority of the water lost was due to reductions in groundwater caused by human activities. By periodically measuring gravity regionally, GRACE tells scientists how much water storage changes over time.

Credit: NASA/UC Irvine/NCAR

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