Since publishing NASA Earth Observatory Goes to the Beach in July 2017, we have explored even more of the planet’s coasts via satellite images and astronaut photographs. This week, we return to the beach with a look back at some of our favorite seaside stories published in recent years. The images and text on this page first appeared on November 19, 2023.

An astronaut aboard the International Space Station took this photograph of Destin, Florida, a beach city situated on the Gulf of Mexico coastline.

The city is built on a peninsula that separates the Gulf of Mexico from the Choctawhatchee Bay. Ship transport between the Gulf of Mexico and the bay is possible via the East Pass, while a bridge connects Destin to Santa Rosa Island. The thin white streaks seen in the water are wakes from boats.

Destin is part of Florida’s Emerald Coast, an area that spans about 100 miles (160 kilometers) of the Florida Panhandle. The beaches in this area are known for their “sugary white” sand and green-toned waters. The white sand is comprised primarily of quartz grains that were transported from the southern Appalachian Mountains by the Apalachicola River system. Sunlight interacting with algae in the water produces the emerald color.

Destin’s white sandy beaches, emerald waters, and proximity to the Gulf of Mexico make the town a popular tourist destination. Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection reports an estimated total of 4.5 million annual visitors to Florida’s Emerald Coast. Many tourists visit the area because Destin is a major fishing destination.

This peninsula was initially a barrier island. Over time, coastal processes including hurricanes, sand transport, and changing sea levels connected the peninsula to mainland Florida.

The astronaut used a high-focal-length lens to capture this shot. High-focal-length lenses make it possible for space station crew to take high-resolution photographs of the surface with handheld digital cameras while in a low Earth orbit of approximately 254 miles (400 kilometers).

Astronaut photograph ISS069-E-39255 was acquired on July 30, 2023, with a Nikon D5 digital camera using a focal length of 1150 millimeters. The image was provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations Facility and the Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit at Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by a member of the Expedition 69 crew. It has been cropped and enhanced to improve contrast, and lens artifacts have been removed. The International Space Station Program supports the laboratory as part of the ISS National Lab to help astronauts take pictures of Earth that will be of the greatest value to scientists and the public and to make those images freely available on the Internet. Additional images taken by astronauts and cosmonauts can be viewed at the NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. Caption by Minna Adel Rubio, GeoControl Systems, JETS Contract at NASA-JSC.

The Supreme Court on Monday kept a hold on efforts in Texas and Florida to limit how Facebook, TikTok, X, YouTube and other social media platforms regulate content posted by their users.

The justices returned the cases to lower courts in challenges from trade associations for the companies.

While the details vary, both laws aimed to address conservative complaints that the social media companies were liberal-leaning and censored users based on their viewpoints, especially on the political right. The cases are among several this term in which the justices are wrestling with standards for free speech in the digital age.

The Florida and Texas laws were signed by Republican governors in the months following decisions by Facebook and Twitter, now X, to cut then-President Donald Trump off over his posts related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters.

Trade associations representing the companies sued in federal court, claiming that the laws violated the platforms’ speech rights. One federal appeals court struck down Florida’s statute, while another upheld the Texas law. But both were on hold pending the outcome at the Supreme Court.

In a statement when he signed the Florida measure into law, Gov. Ron DeSantis said it would be “protection against the Silicon Valley elites.”

When Gov. Greg Abbott signed the Texas law, he said it was needed to protect free speech in what he termed the new public square. Social media platforms “are a place for healthy public debate where information should be able to flow freely — but there is a dangerous movement by social media companies to silence conservative viewpoints and ideas,” Abbott said. “That is wrong, and we will not allow it in Texas.”

But much has changed since then. Elon Musk purchased Twitter and, besides changing its name, eliminated teams focused on content moderation, welcomed back many users previously banned for hate speech and used the site to spread conspiracy theories.

Thirteen out of the 15 housing markets at the highest risk of a home price correction in the coming months, according to a recent Parcl Labs study, are in Florida, where new inventory has been flooding in.

The Parcl Labs’ team, which delivers real-time housing market data, analytics and research, analyzed around 1,000 U.S. housing markets to identify early signs of market stress that could lead to price drops. It found that there’s “trouble” ahead for the Sunshine State, which it described as “the epicenter” of a mismatch between supply and demand.

The top five list of markets with the biggest supply and demand divergence—one of the factors considered in Parcl Labs’ analysis, are in Florida—namely, Pensacola (+52 percent supply increase, -28 percent demand decrease); North Port, FL (+50 percent, -18 percent); Naples (+44 percent, -14 percent); Port St. Lucie (+40 percent, -22 percent); and Palm Bay (+39 percent, -18 percent).

Four of the top five markets expected to see the biggest price drops in the months ahead—though any decline isn’t guaranteed—are also in the state. These include some of the same metropolitan areas which are seeing demand drop, such as North Port (52 percent of listings with price cuts); Tampa (49 percent); Naples (46 percent); and Palm Bay (44 percent). Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, was also in the top five with an expected 46 percent with price cuts.

Several markets in Florida have already seen dramatic price cuts since the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, which saw the U.S. housing market boom as low mortgage rates, high demand and a lack of supply led aspiring home buyers to cutthroat bidding wars.

In Florida, the widespread possibility of remote work led to an influx of people moving from out of state chasing warm weather, sunny skies and cheaper taxes. The end of the health emergency and businesses’ eagerness to get their workers back in the office meant a sudden slowdown in arrivals, as well as the departure of some of those who had already migrated to the Sunshine State.

In Lakeland, according to Parcl Labs’ data, prices are now -4.63 percent from their peak in 2020. They increased by 51.36 percent in 2020. In Sebastian, they’re down -4.14 percent from their peak of +61.43 ; in Gainesville, by 2.28% from +50.21 percent. Deltona, Homosassa Springs, Tampa, Ocala, Port St. Lucie, Miami and Orlando have also seen prices cool down from their pandemic peaks.

Inventory has been growing at a faster pace in the state than in the rest of the country. Florida, together with Texas, is among the states that has been building the most new homes in the past few years, trying to fill the gap between demand and inventory which marked the pandemic. But now, as mortgage rates remain high and home insurance premiums in the Sunshine State inflate, buyers are a little more reluctant.

Newsweek contacted Parcl Labs for comment by email early on Monday.

The 15 metropolitan areas which are most likely to see home price drops, according to Parcl Labs, are:

• Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, Florida;
• Daphne-Fairhope-Foley, Alabama;
• Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach, Florida;
• Gainesville, Florida;
• Homosassa Springs, Florida;
• Lakeland-Winter Haven, Florida;
• Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, Florida;
• Myrtle Beach-Conway-North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina;
• Naples-Marco Island, Florida;
• Ocala, Florida;
• Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, Florida;
• Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville, Florida;
• Port St. Lucie, Florida;
• Sebastian-Vero Beach, Florida;
• Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, Florida.