NASA BOREAS Project: Airborne and Field Campaign Measurements for Earth Science

NASA's BOREAS project inventory includes measurements from airborne campaigns and ground stations. Data sets contain precipitation, streamflow, and meteorological data from multiple stations across Canada, collected primarily from 1994 to 1996. The project also incorporates surface and upper air meteorological data spanning from 1961 to 1997.

Use Cases

• Analyzing precipitation patterns based on 15-minute interval rain gauge data mentioned in the description.
• Modeling surface energy fluxes based on aircraft-measured radiation and gas concentration data.
• Studying long-term meteorological trends based on multi-decade surface station records.
• Calibrating remote sensing products using coordinated airborne and field campaign measurements.

Strengths

• Includes data from 23 meteorological stations across Canada.
• Covers a multi-year time range, with some records spanning from 1961 to 1997.
• Contains coordinated measurements from both airborne instruments and ground-based field campaigns.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Some surface meteorological data were averaged to 5-day intervals for public distribution, reducing temporal resolution.

Provenance

Source

NASA BOREAS Project teams, Canadian Atmospheric Environment Service (AES), NOAA/ATDD.

Collection Method

Collected via airborne instruments (e.g., NOAA Long-EZ Aircraft), tipping bucket rain gauges, Belfort rain gauges, and meteorological stations.

Time Range

Primary campaign data from 1994-1996; supporting meteorological data from 1961-1997.

Freshness

Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.

Geography

BOREAS Northern (NSA) and Southern (SSA) Study Areas in Canada, and stations across Canada.