Landsat-8 Long Arctic Swath
- Visualizations by:
- Lori Perkins
- Written by:
- Lori Perkins and
- Matthew Radcliff
- Scientific consulting by:
- James R. Irons
- Produced by:
- Matthew Radcliff
- View full credits
The Landsat 8 swath begins in Sweden and Finland, then crosses the Greenland Sea and Northern Greenland. The scenes then take us over North America, through Canada's Nunavut and Northwest Territories, before ending up offshore of British Columbia. In its entirety, the flyover is composed of 52 individual Landsat scenes and covers an area about 6,800 kilometers wide (4200 by 120 miles).
"These Landsat swaths provide stunning views of transitions across the most infrequently visited areas of our planet," said Jim Irons, NASA's project scientist for Landsat 8.
The full swaths offer a unique perspective by showing Earth as the satellite "sees" it on its orbital path. And like the view from a cross-country flight on an airplane, there are often clouds blocking the view of the ground.
"When you add the multi-temporal and historic nature of the Landsat data archive into consideration," Irons said, "the views become vital in observing seasonal and interannual changes to a region that is most sensitive to climate change."
Credits
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
Animators
- Lori Perkins (NASA/GSFC) [Lead]
- Greg Shirah (NASA/GSFC)
Data visualizer
- Lori Perkins (NASA/GSFC) [Lead]
Writer
- Matthew Radcliff (KBRwyle) [Lead]
Scientist
- James R. Irons (NASA/GSFC) [Lead]
Producer
- Matthew Radcliff (KBRwyle) [Lead]
Missions
This visualization is related to the following missions:Datasets used in this visualization
Landsat-8 True Color (A.K.A. Band Combination 2,3,4) (Collected with the OLI sensor)
Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.
Related pages
Untitled
March 3, 2015, 6 a.m.
Read moreHitch a ride with a satellite as it takes flight over the Arctic on the summer solstice. While much of the Arctic is still frozen in June, the ice is in various stages of melting. See a satellite’s view of the region in this video. Greenland’s Elephant Foot Glacier is a piedmont-type glacier, which form when ice spills from a steep valley onto a relatively flat plain. The various stages of sea ice in the Amundsen Gulf include blue ice, first-year ice, dark grey ice, and brash ice. On Canada’s Victoria Island, early season melt water carries sediment from glacial erosion into lakes, giving them a uniform green color.
Landsat 8 Crosses the Arctic
Feb. 16, 2015, 11 a.m.
Read moreThe Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 acquired this unbroken swath of images on June 21, 2014—the summer solstice—when the Sun stays above the horizon of the Arctic for at least 24 hours. While much of the region is still frozen in June, the ice is in various stages of melting.For complete transcript, click here.Watch this video on the NASA Earth Observatory YouTube channel.Music: Thin Ice Mining by Chris Constantinou [PRS], Paul Frazer [PRS] Melting Glacier by Chris Constantinou [PRS], Paul Frazer [PRS] Undiscovered Oceans by Aaron Yeddidia [BMI], Chris Lang [BMI], Eric Cunningham [BMI] Another Sleep by Chris Constantinou [PRS], Paul Frazer [PRS] On June 21, 2014—the summer solstice—when the Sun stays above the horizon of the Arctic for at least 24 hours, Landsat 8 acquired this unbroken swath of images. While much of the region is still frozen in June, the ice is in various stages of melting.The Landsat 8 swath begins in Sweden and Finland, then crosses the Greenland Sea and northern Greenland. The scenes then take us over North America, through Canada’s Nunavut and Northwest Territories, before ending up offshore of British Columbia. In its entirety, the flyover is composed of 52 individual Landsat scenes and covers an area about 6,800 kilometers long and 200 kilometers wide (4,200 by 120 miles).“These Landsat swaths provide stunning views of transitions across the most remote and infrequently visited areas of our planet,” said Jim Irons, NASA’s project scientist for Landsat 8.The full swaths offer a unique perspective by showing Earth as the satellite “sees” it on its orbital path. And like the view from a cross-country flight on an airplane, there are often clouds blocking the view of the ground.“When you add the multi-temporal and historic nature of the Landsat data archive into consideration,” Irons said, “the views become vital in observing seasonal and interannual changes to a region that is most sensitive to climate change.”For more information: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ArcticLongSwath/.