Russia's Volga River is the largest river system in Europe,
draining over 1.3 million square kilometers of catchment area
into the Caspian Sea. The brackish Caspian is Earth's largest
landlocked water body, and its isolation from the world's oceans
has enabled the preservation of several unique animal and plant
species. The Volga provides most of the Caspian's fresh water
and nutrients, and also discharges large amounts of sediment and
industrial waste into the relatively shallow northern part of
the sea. These images of the region were captured by the Multi-
angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer on October 5, 2001, during Terra
orbit 9567. Each image represents an area of approximately 275
kilometers x 376 kilometers. The left-hand image is from MISR's
nadir (vertical-viewing) camera, and shows how light is
reflected at red, green, and blue wavelengths. The right-hand
image is a false color composite of red-band imagery from MISR's
60-degree backward, nadir, and 60-degree forward-viewing
cameras, displayed as red,