MASTER Airborne Multispectral Imagery of Western US from May 2004

MASTER airborne sensor data captures calibrated radiance across 50 spectral bands from 0.460 to 12.879 micrometers. Five flights over New Mexico, California, Utah, and Colorado in May 2004 provide georeferenced imagery at approximately 15-meter spatial resolution. The U.S. Department of Energy's Remote Sensing Laboratory coordinated this deployment.

Use Cases

• Land surface temperature analysis using thermal infrared bands (up to 12.879 µm).
• Vegetation and mineralogical studies via visible and near-infrared spectral bands (0.460 µm and above).
• Geospatial analysis and alignment using the provided L1B georeferenced imagery and flight paths.
• Sensor validation and algorithm development by comparing 50-band airborne data with satellite instruments like MODIS or ASTER.
• Generating browse images for quick visual assessment of flight coverage and data quality.

Strengths

• Provides high-resolution (~15m) airborne data across 50 spectral bands, filling a gap between satellite and ground measurements.
• Includes calibrated radiance products (Level 1B) essential for quantitative analysis.
• Covers a diverse geographic area across four western U.S. states over a focused five-day period.

Limitations

• Specific row/column counts and dataset size are not provided by any source.
• Sources conflict on the last updated date (2004-05-25 vs. 2026-03 13), suggesting metadata inconsistency.
• Primary data is in HDF-4 format, which may require specialized software for access and processing.

Provenance

Source

U.S. Department of Energy's Remote Sensing Laboratory (RSL) at Nellis Air Force Base.

Collection Method

Data collected by the MODIS/ASTER Airborne Simulator (MASTER) instrument aboard a DOE B-200 aircraft.

Time Range

2004-05-20 to 2004-05-25

Freshness

2026-03-13 00:49:02.257446

Geography

New Mexico, California, Utah, and Colorado, U.S.