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Landsat satellites collect data in the visible (30m), panchromatic (15m), mid-infrared (30m) and thermal infrared (60 to 120m) regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. These data have an approximately 16 day repeat cycle with a 10:00am equator crossing time. This data is particularly valuable for land cover and vegetation parameter mapping. Due to an instrument malfunction onboard Landsat 7 in May 2003, the Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) is now only able to provide useful image data within the central ~20km of the swath. As Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper is still in operation, it is being increasingly relied upon. The approximate scene size is 170 × 183km. While there is no budget allocation for purchasing Landsat data, it is useful to keep these overpasses in mind for future reference. Landsat data can be downloaded from NASA.
Mission |
Landsat |
Sensor |
TM & MSS (MSS) was turned off in
Aug. 1995 |
ETM+ |
Spacecraft |
Landsat-5 |
Landsat-7 |
Launch date |
1st, Mar. 1984 |
15th, Apr. 1999 |
Design life |
minimum 3 years |
minimum 5 years |
Orbit |
Sun-synchronous, polar orbit in altitude of 705km.Cross Equator at 9:45am ((±15min) local time (descending mode) |
Sun-synchronous, polar orbit in altitude of 705km.Cross Equator at 10:00am ((±15min) local time (descending mode) |
Spacecraft operations control centre |
NASA |
Channel and wavelength (micrometers) |
5 bands VNIR
(0.45-1.75) |
1 band TIR
(10.40-12.50) |
1 band SWIR
(2.08-2.35) |
1 band PAN
(0.52-0.90; +ETM only) |
Incidence angle(°) |
0 |
Swath (km) |
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Spatial resolution (m) |
30 |
120 (TM), 60 (+ETM) |
30 |
15 |
Temporal resolution |
Repeat coverage 16 days |
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