White-laced boot

It's been cold and snowy here in Boulder, but Europe is getting hit far harder: they're having record freezes, and over the weekend Italy got a huge pile of snow dumped on them too, the largest in about 30 years. It's closed airports and disrupted a lot of the daily activity... but from space, it's actually quite beautiful:

[Click to molto embiggiano.]

The clouds and snow make it hard at first to see Italy, but it runs from the upper left to lower right in this picture, taken by the European Space Agency's Envisat. The Adriatic Sea is above Italy, and the Tyrrhenian Sea below. You can just see a piece of Sicily, and the islands of Corsica and Sardinia are visible as well.

I'm always amazed at the perspective of space. Disasters, trouble, and the frailty of life are so apparent when you're in their midst, but they fade rapidly with distance. It doesn't make them any less real or any less terrible, but it does provide a longer view that all of us, perhaps, can use sometimes.

Image credit: ESA

Related posts:

- Buonanotte, Italia
- Claire de lune
- Crown of the Dolomites
- Snowpocalypse 2011 from space!