VJ203MOD: JPSS-2 VIIRS Terrain-Corrected Geolocation Data

The VJ203MOD product provides Level 1 terrain-corrected geolocation data from the NOAA-21 (JPSS-2) satellite's VIIRS instrument. It contains derived line-of-sight vectors and geodetic coordinates for each 750-meter moderate-resolution pixel, including latitude, longitude, surface height, solar and sensor angles, a land/water mask, and a quality flag. This dataset is a fundamental input for generating higher-level VIIRS M-band products.

Use Cases

• Precise georeferencing of VIIRS imagery based on latitude and longitude coordinates.
• Atmospheric correction using solar and sensor zenith and azimuth angles.
• Land/water separation for terrestrial or oceanic studies using the included mask.
• Quality assessment and filtering of downstream products using the pixel quality flag.
• Validation and correction of satellite sensor geometry using the documented on-orbit error analysis.

Strengths

• Product has undergone on-orbit validation, with documented corrections for geolocation errors (e.g., ~350 m along-scan, ~165 m along-track for moderate-resolution bands).
• Provides a fundamental, terrain-corrected input for numerous higher-level VIIRS data products.
• Dataset is hosted on multiple authoritative platforms (Data.gov, NASA Earthdata), indicating established use.

Limitations

• Specific column names, row counts, and dataset size are not provided in the available metadata.
• License is listed as 'other-license-specified' without further detail on Data.gov, while it is 'None' on NASA Earthdata.
• Metadata for key fields like author and last update date is inconsistent or missing across sources.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Collection Method

Generated from the VIIRS sensor on the Joint Polar-orbiting Satellite System-2 (JPSS-2/NOAA-21) platform, using an algorithm incorporating Earth ellipsoid, geoid, digital terrain model, ephemeris, and attitude data.

Freshness

2026-04-09 20:45:24.316427

Geography

Global