JERS-1 SAR: 100-m Flood Season Mosaics of South America

JERS-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar data provides the first high-resolution, single-season coverage of the entire Amazon River Basin. The dataset consists of 66 GeoTIFF files, with 32 mosaics for the low flood season (Sep-Dec 1995) and 34 for the high flood season (May-Jul 1996). Its ~100-meter resolution and cloud-penetrating radar sensor enable observation of surface water and land cover changes independent of weather.

Use Cases

• Mapping flood extent and wetland inundation based on the dual-season radar imagery.
• Analyzing land use and land cover change in the Amazon Basin using cloud-penetrating SAR data.
• Monitoring seasonal hydrological cycles by comparing low and high flood season mosaics.
• Providing a historical baseline for climate change impact studies on tropical rainforests.

Strengths

• Provides first-ever high-resolution, single-season coverage of the entire Amazon River Basin.
• Contains 66 precisely georeferenced image mosaics across two distinct hydrological seasons.
• Uses cloud-penetrating Synthetic Aperture Radar, enabling observation independent of weather conditions.

Limitations

• Conflicting last-updated dates: one source lists 1996-07-31, another lists 2026-04-10.
• Limited temporal coverage, capturing only two seasons from 1995-1996.
• Specific license terms are unclear, only listed as 'other-license-specified'.

Provenance

Source

Japanese Earth Resources Satellite 1 (JERS-1) operated by the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA), processed by NASA.

Collection Method

Satellite imagery mosaicked from approximately 50 scenes per tile into 34 tiles per season.

Time Range

1995-09 to 1996-07

Freshness

1996-07-31 23:59:59.999000

Geography

South America, specifically the Amazon River Basin.