Like life-supporting blood, water courses through the Everglades, sustains and feeds the diverse plants and animals found in sawgrass prairies, hardwood hammocks and ponds. Man-made changes in the past century altered the area nearly beyond repair. The Everglades has been halved, and water has been diverted away to support agricultural and urban needs as plants and animals inhabiting the wetlands suffer. Unfortunately, these man-made changes stressed the fragile wetland ecosystem – possibly to an irreparable extent.

The Everglades ecosystem thrives on very wet summers and drought-like winters. Water from the Florida Kissimmee River basin drains to Lake Okeechobee and, from there, flows through the Everglades into the Gulf of Mexico. Farms, sugar fields, golf courses, and homes use fertilizers and other chemicals, which enter the Everglades water supply and harm native plants, causing major changes in the natural habitat. In addition, a series of water management control structures were built across the Everglades to provide flood protection and water storage areas for the steadily increasing population of south Florida.

Using satellite observations of South Florida, researchers can view detailed images of water level changes in the Everglades. CSTARS provides imagery helpful to water management and wetlands restoration. The remote sensing observations are acquired along the satellite path with swath widths of 50 to 100 km. This project is the only one in the world providing unprecedented detailed observations of wetland hydrology.