Food and Water

Here's what the world's fishing industry looks like from space

A fishing boat arrives at Samut Sakhon port in Thailand November 22, 2016. Picture taken November 22, 2016. REUTERS/Jorge Silva

Light given off by fishing boats at night is clearly visible from the International Space Station.

Image: REUTERS/Jorge Silva

A picture taken from the International Space Station in December shows a small but stunning sliver of the commercial fishing industry.

The photo, shared by the NASA Earth Observatory, shows portions of Thailand and its surrounding bodies of water at night, as seen from the north looking south. The yellow portions are the lights of cities around Thailand and Cambodia (the brightest concentration is the greater Bangkok area) while the glowing green lights in the Andaman Sea on the right and the Gulf of Thailand to the left belong to myriad fishing boats. Boats use the green lights to attract fish, which are then used to bait squid.

The full image. The brightest glowing region is Bangkok. Image: Quartz/NASA

While the glow is slightly exaggerated due to the long exposure (according to the image’s metadata, it was shot at 1/5 of a second, which is why the details are not entirely sharp) seeing clusters of boats glowing at a similar intensity to cities on land lends some perspective to the massive industry behind the food we eat.

A close-up look at the fishing vessels. Image: Quartz/NASA
Don't miss any update on this topic

Create a free account and access your personalized content collection with our latest publications and analyses.

Sign up for free

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

Share:
World Economic Forum logo

Forum Stories newsletter

Bringing you weekly curated insights and analysis on the global issues that matter.