Airborne Multi-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer Monterey 1999 Campaign Data

Nine viewing angles and four spectral bands were captured by the Airborne Multi-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer (AirMISR) on June 29, 1999, during a 13-minute flight over Monterey, California. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory built the instrument for NASA, and it collected overlapping imagery from a single camera mounted on a pivoting gimbal on the NASA ER-2 aircraft. This dataset provides multi-angle spectral imagery designed to support studies of Earth's ecology and climate.

Use Cases

• Analyzing vegetation structure and health using the four spectral bands across nine viewing angles.
• Validating satellite-derived surface reflectance models by comparing with airborne multi-angle imagery.
• Studying aerosol properties and cloud effects using the differential reflectance data from fore and aft camera angles.
• Mapping land cover types in Monterey, California, using nadir and oblique geospatial imagery.

Strengths

• Provides calibrated multi-angle imagery from nine distinct viewing angles (0°, 26.1°, 45.6°, 60.0°, 70.5° fore and aft).
• Offers high spatial resolution, with nadir view pixels at 7 meters cross-track by 6 meters along-track.
• Captures data in four spectral bands per angle, enabling detailed spectral analysis for ecological studies.
• The dataset's cross-platform presence on NASA Earthdata and Data.gov indicates its established use and importance.

Limitations

• The dataset is a single snapshot from June 29, 1999, offering no temporal series for change analysis.
• Key metadata such as row count, file size, and exact column names are not provided across any source.
• Sources disagree on the license: NASA Earthdata lists it as unknown, while Data.gov lists 'other-license-specified', creating uncertainty.

Provenance

Source

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, California, for NASA.

Collection Method

Data acquired by the AirMISR instrument, a single camera on a pivoting gimbal, flown on the NASA ER-2 aircraft.

Time Range

1999-06-29

Freshness

1999-07-13 23:59:59.999000

Geography

Monterey, California, USA.