MODIS/Aqua NRT MYD29: Sea Ice Extent & Temperature Swath Data

Near Real Time (NRT) data from the MODIS instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite provides 5-minute swath observations of sea ice. The dataset contains fields for sea ice extent derived from a modified Normalized Difference Snow Index (NDSI) and Ice Surface Temperature (IST), each with corresponding pixel-level quality assessment. Geospatial data is provided in HDF-EOS format with 1km resolution for ice fields and 5km resolution for latitude/longitude geolocation.

Use Cases

• Monitoring daily sea ice extent changes based on reflectance-derived ice fields.
• Analyzing ice surface temperature trends using the IST field.
• Assessing data quality for specific pixels using the provided QA layers.
• Mapping polar region ice coverage at 1km resolution for model validation.

Strengths

• Provides near real-time (NRT) data, enabling timely monitoring of polar conditions.
• Contains pixel-level quality assessment (QA) fields for both sea ice and temperature data.
• Offers high spatial resolution, with ice data at 1km and geolocation at 5km.
• Dataset is hosted by NASA, a recognized authority for Earth observation data.

Limitations

• Key metadata such as row count, file size, and specific license terms are not provided across all sources.
• The dataset's temporal coverage (start/end dates) is not specified in the available descriptions.
• Data is stored in HDF-EOS format, which may require specialized tools for access and analysis.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing via the MODIS instrument on the Aqua spacecraft.

Freshness

2026-04-10 00:53:39.157102

Geography

Global, with focus on polar sea ice regions.