Alaska Snow Cover Extent and Depth at 1 km Resolution, 2001-2017

Maximum snow cover extent and snow depth estimates for each 8-day composite period from 2001 to 2017 across Alaska at 1 km resolution. The dataset was produced by NASA using a downscaling scheme that incorporates MODIS snow cover data and MERRA-2 reanalysis data. It covers the majority of Alaska's land area, excluding perennial ice/snow or open water.

Use Cases

• Modeling seasonal snowpack evolution based on 8-day composite snow cover extent.
• Analyzing the influence of local topography on snow distribution patterns based on the described downscaling method.
• Studying long-term snow depth trends in Alaska from 2001 to 2017.
• Improving predictions for cloud-contaminated pixels using the elevation-based spatial filtering algorithm described.

Strengths

• Provides data at 1 km spatial resolution, which is finer than the source MERRA-2 0.5 degree data.
• Coverage spans 17 years from 2001 to 2017.
• Addresses cloud contamination in MODIS data with a described spatial filtering algorithm.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Downscaling scheme incorporating MODIS SCE and MERRA-2 snow depth data.

Time Range

2001 to 2017

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-12 19:37:20.657930; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Majority land area of Alaska, excluding perennial ice/snow or open water.