VJ203DNB_NRT: VIIRS Day/Night Band Geolocation Swath

NASA's JPSS-2/NOAA-21 satellite provides terrain-corrected geolocation data for the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) Day/Night Band. The product includes latitude, longitude, surface height, and solar, lunar, and sensor viewing angles for each 750-meter pixel. On-orbit validation corrected geolocation errors, bringing uncertainties to within 75 meters (1-sigma) in both scan directions.

Use Cases

• Precise georeferencing of nighttime imagery based on terrain-corrected latitude and longitude.
• Analyzing urban light pollution using calibrated lunar and solar illumination angles.
• Masking land and water features for environmental models using the included land/water mask.
• Correcting atmospheric and topographic effects in imagery using sensor and solar zenith angles.

Strengths

• Geolocation accuracy validated on-orbit, with corrected uncertainties within 75 meters (1-sigma).
• Contains multiple derived geolocation parameters, including lunar illumination data critical for low-light analysis.
• Available in Near Real Time (NRT), supporting time-sensitive applications.

Limitations

• Key metadata like column names, row count, and dataset size are not provided on any platform.
• The 'last updated' date of 2026-04-09 appears to be a future date, indicating potential metadata errors.
• Descriptions are highly technical and repetitive across platforms, with sparse practical metadata.

Provenance

Source

NASA VIIRS instrument on the Joint Polar-orbiting Satellite System-2 (JPSS-2/NOAA-21) platform.

Collection Method

Derived from satellite ephemeris, attitude data, and digital terrain models using a geolocation algorithm.

Freshness

2026-04-09 20:46:10.862399

Geography

Global swath coverage from a polar-orbiting satellite.