SPOT 2 ceased commercial operations on 30 June 2009 and was deorbited one month later. To salute the venerable satellite’s near 20 years in service, Spot Image decided to tell the story behind its last image.
This is the story of a raging river tamed to a trickle: the Colorado River.

The Colorado is no longer reaching its delta

We searched our archive back to 9 June 1992 to find the 1st image of the Colorado River acquired by SPOT 2 and we compared it with the satellite’s last image.

The Colorado is a raging river that descends for 2,330 km from the wide canyons of the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of California.

Before reaching the Mexican border, the waters of the Colorado are shared by 7 U.S. states where they are used to irrigate farmlands, generate electricity and supply drinking water. Mexico has signed a treaty with the United States stipulating that 9% of the river’s waters must reach its delta. The quantity that reaches the Gulf of California is reduced to 4% by evaporation. As a result, the Colorado is no longer reaching its mouth and its delta is slowly but steadily silting and drying up.

The two full-resolution SPOT 2 images tell the story: in 1992, three branches of the river wound their way to the estuary (in green); by 2009, two of them have silted up completely.