The present work shows the temporal evolution of the Doce River discharge and turbidity plume at the Espírito Santo coast, southeast Brazil, using in situ data and Landsat images from 1985 to 2016. MODIS-Aqua imagery was used to analyze changes in the dispersion of the plume under influence of synoptic atmospheric systems. Turbidity maps were obtained using a globally parameterized model, which had a reasonable comparison with in situ data obtained at the river mouth. The Doce River watershed has been suffering from various environmental e.g., precipitation variability, and anthropogenic stressors e.g., land-use changes, impacting the quality and volume of the river over the years, with an overall negative discharge tendency, and a high interannual variability, with frequent flooding events, causing higher turbidity. In 2015 the river faced its worst disaster with the collapse of a mining waste water dam, which increased turbidity, despite the low discharge caused by a drought season. The denser turbid plume traveled up to ~13 km towards the southern shelf, and the diluted plume more than 75 km, as during high flooding events. Changes on the dominant wind pattern from NE to S, can change the dominant flow of the plume from S to E-NE, and increase turbidity over the northern shelf, with contribution of other rivers and bottom resuspension. The Doce River plume should be monitored with satellite imagery and in situ campaigns as flooding events are likely to occur and may still wash out mud accumulated in the main river.