5/3/2005: Korea at night

[tw]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Perhaps a high-contrast light, versus the blackness of sea, seems brighter on the image.

In IR pictures I had seen raw from the satellite, ground lights and clouds both appear. Those globs of 'light' in the oceans could just as easily been clouds. Notice a shortage of cloud cover in N Korea. Just another reason that the original picture posted by UT leaves me suspicious. Were clouds electronically removed in N Korea but not in S Korea or over the ocean? We have no way of knowing. We can only speculate. But it does look so. Cloud cover would explain those lights in the Korea Strait, Sea of Japan, etc.

Yes, IR from clouds does appear in night time images.