Drying Lake Poopó, Bolivia
"Lake Poopó, Bolivia’s second-largest lake and an important fishing resource for local communities, has dried up once again because of drought and diversion of water sources for mining and agriculture. The last time it dried was in 1994, after which it took several years for water to return and even longer for ecosystems to recover. In wet times, the lake has spanned an area approaching 1,200 square miles (3,000 square kilometers). Its shallow depth—typically no more than 9 feet (3 meters)—makes it particularly vulnerable to fluctuations."
yep....noticed that too.
Um, no I didn't notice that at all. One effort shows data from 2004, mainly due to 2004 being such a major year for the Muir Glacier. The rest are pretty recent. 20% are from 2020. 75% from the last 5 years.
Unless you meant that any remote sensing data is from the past, even if taken seconds ago.
Satellite data usually takes a little while to be made public due to processing requirements (e.g. ICESat-2 was launched in 2018, but some higher level products haven't been produced yet.) Then researchers need time to figure out what the data is actually showing.
Also, regarding the images being a few years old, that’s obviously for security reasons. Satellite images made available to the public are never current for obvious reasons.