USGS Landsat data to be made available on web

On June 4, 2007, the USGS will be releasing selected Landsat 7 image data of the United States through the Web (glovis.usgs.gov or earthexplorer.usgs.gov). The data is said to have limited cloud cover.

This Web enabled distribution of recently acquired data is taken as a pilot project for the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM), currently projected for launch in 2011. The project will allow the Landsat data user community to help refine the distribution system planned for the upcoming LDCM. Each image presented will be ortho-rectified, prior to being placed on the Web.

Currently Landsat data has been found useful in wide range of applications ranging from disaster monitoring to global crop condition analysis. The Web-based distribution Landsat data through the web will allow the user community easier access to Landsat 7 data.

In the Landsat series of satellites Landsat 7 is the recent one which was launched during 1999, and has the capacity to collect and transmit up to 532 images per day. It is in a sun-synchronous orbit an altitude of 705 kilometers. The main instrument on board Landsat 7 is the Enhanced Thematic Mapper (ETM). Landsat 7 has a panchromatic camera which is providing data at 15m spatial resolution and a thermal infrared channel with 60 m spatial resolution.