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Figure 5: 8-day composite maps (17 th January 2004) for snow cover obtained by MODIS (left) and by the
model (right). The snow free area is reported in green, the snow covered area is in white in MODIS map, in
white-blue colour scale (legend on the right) in the model map. The pixels for which it was not possible to
detect snow due to cloud cover are in yellow.
Figure 6: 8-day composite maps (29 h March 2004) for snow cover obtained by MODIS (left) and by the
model (right). The snow free area is reported in green, the snow covered area is in white in MODIS map, in
white-blue colour scale (legend on the right) in the model map.
The second pair (Figure 4) is an example of the late autumn season, after several days without
solid precipitation. The snow patterns are controlled here also by slope and aspect, and there are
some white spots inside the snow free area in the pixels receiving a less amount of radiation. The
agreement is fairly good, although not all the white spots agree in detail, but it has to be taken into
account that MODIS maps may be affected by some commission errors (for example the white
spot located near the lake in the bottom of the valley is very unlikely).
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