This image, from Robert Bryant's article Monitoring playa systems using remote sensing: Methods and applications, was extracted from an Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) time series of
10-day data stretching from 1996 to 2000. It is one of a series of four images chosen for this article to show various stages of two flood events on Etosha Pan, Namibia. Such images can help researchers better understand the dynamics of flooding events in playa systems (that is, ephemeral lake systems without any outflow). Ephemeral lakes of this kind are common in the drylands of the world.