Lidar Water Level Profiles for Mississippi River Delta Channels

Fall 2016 lidar data from NASA's Pre-Delta-X campaign provides water surface elevation profiles for river channels between Wax Lake and the Gulf of Mexico. The dataset offers time-specific water levels in meters, calibrated with in-situ field measurements and referenced to NAVD 88 and WGS 84 geoids. It was produced by NASA using an Airborne Snow Observatory (ASO) lidar instrument.

Use Cases

• Calibrating hydrodynamic models for river discharge using precise water level profiles.
• Mapping wetland inundation extent and dynamics from water surface elevation data.
• Analyzing channel morphology and slope from geospatial elevation points along the waterway.
• Validating satellite-derived water level measurements with airborne lidar observations.

Strengths

• Data is calibrated using in-situ field measurements, providing quantified uncertainty estimates.
• Elevations are provided in two standard geodetic references: NAVD 88 and WGS 84.
• Collected using the specialized Airborne Snow Observatory (ASO) lidar instrument.

Limitations

• Key structural metadata like row count, column names, and file size are unavailable from all sources.
• There is a significant conflict in the 'last updated' date between platforms (2016 vs. 2026).
• The specific license terms under 'other-license-specified' are not detailed.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Collection Method

Remotely sensed lidar data from an airborne campaign, combined with in-situ field measurements for calibration.

Time Range

Fall 2016

Freshness

2026-03-12 22:33:51.097055

Geography

River channels between Wax Lake in the Atchafalaya River Basin (Mississippi River Delta) and the Gulf of Mexico, Louisiana, USA.