Landsat

Landsat 9 is a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey, and will continue the Landsat program’s critical role in monitoring, understanding and managing the land resources needed to sustain human life. The mission will provide moderate-resolution (15 meter to 100 meter, depending on spectral frequency) measurements of the Earth's terrestrial and polar regions in visible, near-infrared, short wave infrared, and thermal infrared wavelengths. There are two instruments on the spacecraft, the Thermal InfraRed Sensor 2 (TIRS-2) and the Operational Land Imager 2 (OLI-2).Landsat 9 will provide continuity with the nearly 50-year long Landsat land imaging data set. In addition to widespread routine use for land use planning and monitoring on regional to local scales, support of disaster response and evaluations, and water use monitoring, Landsat measurements directly serve NASA research in the focus areas of climate, carbon cycle, ecosystems, water cycle, biogeochemistry, and Earth surface/interior.The Landsat program is the only U.S. satellite system designed and operated to repeatedly observe the global land surface at a moderate scale that shows both natural and human-induced change. ||

For nearly half a century, the Landsat mission has shaped our understanding of Earth. Since the launch of the first Landsat satellite in 1972, the mission has gathered and archived more than 8 million images of our home planet’s terrain, including crop fields and sprawling cities, forests and shrinking glaciers. These data-rich images are free and publicly available, leading to scientific discoveries and informed resource management.Landsat 9 will carry two instruments that largely replicate the instruments on Landsat 8: the Operational Land Imager 2 (OLI-2) and the Thermal Infrared Sensor 2 (TIRS-2). OLI-2 and TIRS-2 are optical sensors that detect 11 wavelengths of visible, near infrared, shortwave infrared, and thermal infrared light as it is reflected or emitted from the planet’s surface. Data from these instruments are processed and stored at the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota—where decades worth of data from all of the Landsat satellites are stored and made available for free to the public.The Landsat mission, a partnership between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), has provided the longest continuous record of Earth’s land surfaces from space. The consistency of Landsat’s land-cover data from sensor to sensor and year to year makes it possible to trace land-cover changes from 1972 to the present, and it will continue into the future with Landsat 9. With better technology than ever before, Landsat 9 will enhance and extend the data record to the 50-year mark and beyond. ||

Landsat collects light in visible and infrared wavelengths. Sunlight reflects off Earth’s surface, and scientists identify the land cover based on which wavelengths are reflected strongly or weakly.But sunlight is also reflected by particles in the atmosphere, which distorts the data and can lead to what looks like a haze in the imagery. Using basic principles of physics, and knowing the meteorological conditions, scientists can determine the effects of the scattering and absorption as light passes through the atmosphere. This atmospheric correction is essential to determining exactly how much of each wavelength reflected of the features of the surface, and having quantifiable data.The videos below show different examples of atmospheric scattering which need to be accounted for when doing atmospheric correction of satellite data. In these cases, it is for observations over water. The resulting atmospheric corrections are part of the process for the new Landsat Aquatic Reflectance data product. Landsat’s highly calibrated data products, free to download and use, are making detailed Earth-observation data more accessible to users and bringing a greater benefit to society. ||

Much of the water that soaks into the soil from irrigation or rain ultimately returns the the atmosphere as water vapor through direct evaporation from the surface or by transpiration through plant leaves as the plants use the water for growth and seed production. This loss cools the surface and plant canopy just like the evaporation of sweat cools our skin. A cool field in an arid area indicates water use by irrigation. Using the surface temperatures measured by satellites, and some additional information, water resource managers can determine the rate at which water is used in a farm field. ||

Instruments on the Landsat satellites capture images in the visible spectrum, but they also take images in wavelengths invisible to the naked eye. Landsat's thermal imager captures land surface temperature data. As farmers irrigate fields, water evaporates from the soil and transpires from plants' leaves. The combined process is called evapotranspiration. Evapotranspiring water absorbs energy, so farm fields consuming more water appear cooler in the thermal band. Landsat-based evapotranspiration measurements provide an objective way for water managers to assess on a field-by-field basis how much water agricultural growers are using. The measurements have even been used to help settle water rights conflicts in court. ||

A short animation illustrating the relationship of temperature and wavelength. Hotter objects have a shorter wavelength and cooler objects have a longer wavelength. The animation also compares the wavelengths of visible light and thermal infrared radiation. ||

What is the coldest place in the world? It is a high ridge in Antarctica on the East Antarctic Plateau where temperatures in several hollows can dip below minus 133.6° Fahrenheit (minus 92° Celsius) on a clear winter night – colder than the previous recorded low temperature. Narrated animation showing the process by which the coldest place on earth develops its extreme low temperatures.

Landsat 8 (formerly known as LDCM, the Landsat Data Continuity Mission), a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey, will provide moderate-resolution (15 meter - 100 meter, depending on spectral frequency) measurements of the Earth's terrestrial and polar regions in the visible, near-infrared, short wave infrared, and thermal infrared. There are two instruments on the spacecraft, the Thermal InfraRed Sensor (TIRS) and the Operational Land Imager (OLI). Landsat 8 continues the nearly 50-year long Landsat land imaging data set. In addition to widespread routine use for land use planning and monitoring on regional to local scales, support of disaster response and evaluations, and water use monitoring, Landsat 8 measurements directly serve NASA research in the focus areas of climate, carbon cycle, ecosystems, water cycle, biogeochemistry, and Earth surface/interior. ||

The seventh satellite in the long-running Landsat program was launched on April 15, 1999 and is the most accurately calibrated Earth-observing satellite, i.e., its measurements are extremely accurate when compared to the same measurements made on the ground. Landsat 7's sensor has been called "the most stable, best characterized Earth observation instrument ever placed in orbit." Landsat 7's rigorous calibration standards have made it the validation choice for many coarse-resolution sensors.Created for the 10th anniversary of the launch of Landsat 7. ||

The Landsat program offers the longest continuous global record of the Earth’s surface; it continues to deliver visually stunning and scientifically valuable images of our planet. This short video highlights Landsat’s many benefits to society.In 1975, NASA Administrator Dr. James Fletcher predicted that if one space age development would save the world, it would be Landsat and its successor satellites. Since the early 1970s, Landsat has continuously and consistently archived images of Earth; this unparalleled data archive gives scientist the ability to assess changes in Earth’s landscape.For over 40 years, the Landsat program has collected spectral information from Earth’s surface, creating a historical archive unmatched in quality, detail, coverage, and length.“It was the granddaddy of them all, as far as starting the trend of repetitive, calibrated observations of the Earth at a spatial resolution where one can detect man’s interaction with the environment,” Dr. Darrel Williams, the Landsat 7 Project Scientist, states about Landsat.Landsat sensors have a moderate spatial-resolution. You cannot see individual houses on a Landsat image, but you can see large man-made objects such as highways. This is an important spatial resolution because it is coarse enough for global coverage, yet detailed enough to characterize human-scale processes such as urban growth, deforestation, agriculture water use, and more. ||

Graph showing the total number of Landsat scenes downloaded since October 1, 2008, when the USGS instituted their policy to distribute Landsat data for free. In the five years since, over 11 million scenes have been downloaded from the Landsat archive. ||

The Landsat program has been running since 1972, having successfully launched 7 satellites into orbit. (Landsat 6, owned by a private company, failed at launch and never reached orbit.) Since 1972, Landsat satellites have been regularly collecting data about the Earth's land surface to help monitor our natural resources and study how land cover and land use are changing. || Landsat_timeline_5x3wall.png (6830x2304) [1.2 MB] || Landsat_timeline_5x3wall_web.jpg (317x107) [9.1 KB] || Landsat_timeline_5x3wall.png.hwshow [177 bytes] ||

Earth's forests are of incalculable value; they are a vital component of the climate system - controlling gas, energy and water exchange between the surface and atmosphere; the tropical forests alone contain half of all biological species - diversity that underpins human and environmental wellbeing; they are a major source of revenue - timber, non-timber forest products and mineral reserves and they are the primary source of energy for over 2 billion people. Forests have never been under more pressure. Demand for their natural wealth and a hunger for land causes forest clearance at alarming rates. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that the Earth loses an area about the size of a football field every 3 seconds - in the time it takes to make a sandwich an area equivalent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., is cleared... somewhere on Earth trees are falling every second of every day. Based on a systematic sample of Landsat imagery at 4,016 locations around the tropical belt the European Commission's TREES 3 project is making estimates of forest cover change for the years 1990, 2000, 2005 and 2010 with new levels of precision. Preliminary results emphasize just how relentless the pressure on our planet is. Using archived and recent Landsat imagery we have measured dramatic changes to the African Continent for example. Since the 1970s natural vegetation (forests and savannas) have been converted to agricultural land at a tremendous pace. Around 50,000 sq. km per year are cleared - an area twice the size of Vermont. With the fastest growing population in the world such land cover conversions are unlikely to slow down any time soon, nor should the measuring programs. Landsat 8 and its European counterpart, Sentinel 2, are not being launched any sooner than they are needed. ||

The Landsat program is the longest continuous global record of Earth observations from space — ever. On July 23, 1972 NASA launched the first satellite in this program, then known as ERTS, the Earth Resources Technology Satellite and later renamed Landsat 1. In honor of that history, NASA edited together selections of an archive video from 1973 about the ERTS launch.Featured in this 1973 video was a senior geologist at NASA, Nicholas Short, and at Dartmouth College, Robert Simpson and David Lindgren. NASA and the U.S. Department of the Interior through the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) jointly manage Landsat, and the USGS preserves a nearly 50-year archive of Landsat data that is freely available over the Internet. The next Landsat satellite, known as Landsat 9, is scheduled for launch in 2021.For more information about Landsat visit www.nasa.gov/landsat, or landsat.usgs.govTo watch the entire 23-minute long NASA archive video of the ERTS Launch, go here. ||

The Landsat Data Continuity Mission launched on February 11, 2013, from Vandenberg Air Force Base aboard an Atlas V-401 rocket.LDCM will be renamed Landsat 8 when operations are handed over to the US Geological Survey on May 30, 2013. NASA and the U.S. Department of the Interior through the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) jointly manage Landsat, and the USGS preserves a 40-year archive of Landsat images that is freely available data over the Internet. ||

The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) is a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey that will continue the Landsat Program's 40-year data record of monitoring Earth's landscapes from space. LDCM will expand and improve on that record with observations that advance a wide range of Earth sciences and contribute to the management of agriculture, water and forest resources.The LDCM observatory was successfully launched aboard an Atlas V-401 rocket on February 11, 2013, from Vandenberg Air Force Base. The operation of the satellite will be handed over to the U.S. Geological Survey on May 30, 2013. ||

In its five years in space, Landsat 8 made 26,500 orbits around Earth and captured 1.1 million "scenes" of our home planet, representing 16 percent of all the observations kept in the 45-year Landsat archive.Music: Divine Punishment by Christopher Franke [BMI]Complete transcript available. || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_large.01975_print.jpg (1024x576) [50.2 KB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_large.01975_searchweb.png (320x180) [7.1 KB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_large.01975_thm.png (80x40) [1.4 KB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_prores_1920.mov (1920x1080) [4.7 GB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_prores_1280.mov (1280x720) [2.5 GB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_large.mp4 (1920x1080) [191.3 MB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_youtube_1080.mp4 (1920x1080) [327.2 MB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_youtube_720.mp4 (1280x720) [315.6 MB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year_twitter_720.mp4 (1280x720) [53.5 MB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year.webm (960x540) [76.4 MB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year-captions.en_US.srt [3.8 KB] || 12851_Landsat8_5_year-captions.en_US.vtt [3.8 KB] ||

On Feb. 11, 2013, Landsat 8 launched into Earth orbit, riding on an Atlas V rocket. Weighing 6,133 pounds, Landsat 8 is the eigth satellite in the long-running Landsat program, jointly managed by NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey. At 16 feet tall, with a 32 foot long solar array, Landsat 8 orbits Earth at an altitude of 438 miles, moving at a speed of 16,760 miles per hour. It takes 99 minutes to complete one orbit, with about 14.5 orbits each day. There have been 5,319 orbits in the first year of Landsat 8's mission. It takes 16 days to build a complete scan of the globe, and on the 17th day the orbit cycle begins again.Between the two instruments on board, Landsat 8 records data in 11 separate wavelength regions spanning visible, infrared, and thermal radiation. The data is transmitted several times a day to the USGS Earth Resources and Observation Science Center in Sioux Falls, SD, where it is added to the archive of Landsat data stretching back to 1972. In its first year, users have downloaded 1,322,969 scenes of Landsat 8 data from the USGS.Landsat 8 continues the decades-long Landsat record of Earth's land surface at a scale where the impacts of humans and nature can be detected and monitored over time. Every continent, every season, every year, at a resolution that can distinguish an area the size of a baseball field. With help from Landsat we can monitor the cultivation of our food crops, quantify our precious water resources as they ebb and flow, and track deforestation globally. Landsat data constitute a key ingredient in decision making for agriculture, climate research, disaster mitigation, ecosystems, forestry, human health, urban growth, and water management. ||

On Friday, July 20th, in advance of Landsat's 40th birthday and a live NASA press conference on Monday the 23rd, NASA scientists are available to discuss amazing & unprecedented images from space of your region. Cities grow, wildfires rage, rivers flood out of their beds and droughts shrink lakes and reservoirs — all captured by Landsat, the world's longest continuous record of Earth from space. Since 1972, Landsat satellites have been orbiting Earth, telling the story of soil moisture, urban spread, land use, assist disasters & recovery. Next year, the 8th Landsat satellite (LDCM) will be launched from California. The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) will track food production and water resources, organize disaster recovery and monitor the impact of climate change.The following is broadcast quality video roll-ins in Apple ProRes 422, 1280x720, 59.94 fps. ||

A series of Landsat satellites have surveyed the Earth's surface since 1972. In that time, Landsat data have become a vital reference worldwide, used for understanding scientific issues related to land use and natural resources. However, some Landsat images are simply striking to look at - presenting spectacular views of mountains and valleys, forests and farms. To celebrate the 40th anniversary of Landsat, the US Geological Survey and NASA asked for your help in selecting the top five Earth As Art images. ||

Still observing the Earth after 25 years—22 beyond its three-year primary mission lifetime—Landsat 5 collects valuable scientific data daily. Some attribute the satellite's longevity to over-engineering. Others say it's a long run of good luck. Whatever the reason, no one who attended the satellite's March 1984 launch could have expected it would still be working today.For complete transcript, click here. || Landsat5_turns_25_ipodLG.00202_print.jpg (1024x576) [73.2 KB] || Landsat5_turns_25_ipodLG_web.png (320x180) [149.4 KB] || Landsat5_turns_25_ipodLG_thm.png (80x40) [13.9 KB] || Landsat5_turns_25_appletv.webmhd.webm (960x540) [51.8 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_appletv.m4v (960x540) [87.6 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_YouTube.mov (1280x720) [56.6 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_fullresH264.mov (1280x720) [119.3 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_ipodLG.m4v (640x360) [42.3 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_svsSM.mpg (512x288) [32.8 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_ipodSM.m4v (320x180) [16.4 MB] || Landsat5_turns_25_NASAcast.mp4 (320x236) [30.9 MB] || GSFC_20090227_Landsat5turns25.wmv (346x260) [30.5 MB] ||