The San Andreas is the longest fault in California and
one of the most famous geological hot spots in North America.
A new image from NASA’s Shuttle Radar Topography Mission shows
the fault as it runs through the Carrizo Plain, west of
Bakersfield, on its 1,200-kilometer (800-mile) course. The
image is available online at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/pictures/srtm .
The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission system, which flew
onboard Space Shuttle Endeavour in February, gathered
topographic elevation data over approximately 80 percent of
Earth’s land mass during its 10-day flight. The results of the
mission will be the most extensive high-resolution database of
Earth’s topography.
After processing, data from the Shuttle Radar Topography
Mission will be available for active fault zones around the
world. Scientists will be able to use this treasure trove of
information to study places on Earth that have never before
been mapped, much less studied in detail.
More information about the Shuttle Radar Topography
Mission is available at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/ .
The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission is a cooperative
project between NASA, the National Imagery and Mapping Agency
(NIMA), and the German and Italian space agencies. JPL is a
division of the California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena.
