Videos

The Landsat program conceived of in the 1960s, has been running longer than any remote sensing program. The idea was simple: position a satellite in a nearly polar orbit fixed to the solar angle so that each daytime pass would cross the equator at roughly the same local time.

Landsat 7 had the honor of acquiring the satellite program’s 10 millionth scene in November 2021.

The scene captures changes to the Dead Sea, located in Southwest Asia. The Dead Sea is mainly fed by the Jordan River, which enters from the north. However, the water level of the Dead Sea has been falling due to irrigation projects and water use upstream.

The newly launched Landsat 9 experienced a once-in-a-mission lifetime event where its orbit was directly below Landsat 8 for an “underfly.” For several days in the middle of November, the pair of Earth-observing satellites flew together, collecting data at the same time for the same sites and requiring simultaneous downlinking to global ground station antennas.

Landsat 9 launched into space on September 27th, 2021. The "first light" images arrived on October 31st. On that day the satellite captured: algal blooms in Lake Erie, the glaciers of the Himalayas, bush fires in Australia's Eucalypt Woodlands, coastal communities on the Florida panhandle, and deserts, mountains and mesas across the Navajo Nation.

Landsat 9 is a partnership between NASA and USGS. The satellite will continue the Landsat program’s mission to capture repeat snapshots of Earth to monitor, understand and manage natural resources.

[Audio Descriptions]
A short look back at the the history of Landsat launches through the historic articles of the Lompoc Record publication.

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Social scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Fort Collins Science Center – in collaboration with the USGS National Land Imaging Program – conduct Earth observation user case studies using qualitative research methods.

Social scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Fort Collins Science Center – in collaboration with the USGS National Land Imaging Program – conduct Earth observation user case studies using qualitative research methods.

The Landsat archive is the world's longest continuously collected record of the Earth's surface. In mid September, it notched another milestone by adding its nine millionth scene. This particular image from north central Paraguay helps tell the kind of story that only a long historical record like Landsat can.

The Landsat series of Earth-observing satellites has been continuously acquiring land surface imagery since 1972. Over 10 million Landsat scenes are currently available for download. They are also accessible from a cloud environment, in a cloud optimized format that gives you more flexible, customized access.

This Landsat 8 image from May 24th, 2017 shows an enthralling New Zealand landscape. Snow-capped mountain peaks, forests, farmland, and fog highlight the picturesque view of New Zealand's North Island. The scene was downloaded on March 9th, 2020 one of over 29,000 Landsat scenes downloaded worldwide that day. But this scene is special.

USGS Hydrologist Molly Maupin and USGS Research Physical Scientist Gabriel Senay discuss how Landsat imagery has been used by the National Water Census and in studying water use trends.
 

The Landsat archive has added its 8 millionth scene. 

This stunning image was captured by Landsat 8 on July 28, 2018. It shows the coastline of Nordaustlandet, the second-largest island in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago.

What it takes each day to keep Landsat 7 operating smoothly. Hear the stories from inside the L7 Mission Operation Center.

 

Tom Loveland talks about using Landsat's data for land use and land cover change research.

Find this video and thousands more at https://usgs.gov/gallery.

Google's Noel Gorelick talks about the value of Landsat data in the Earth Engine project.

Landsat 9 Project Scientist Jeff Masek discusses the ways Landsat data is used and how important it is to have high quality data.
 

Patrick Hostert from the University of Berlin discusses the value of Landsat's long archive to studying phenology.
 

Leaders in the field of remote sensing discuss working with Landsat data since it began in 1972. With the change to a free and open policy 10 years ago, new and exciting possibilities have opened up.

Kass Green talks about the role Landsat plays to help create high resolution maps, the benefits of the archive at EROS and the value of Landsat imagery to agencies throughout the government.
 

Boston University Professor Curtis Woodcock talks about the significance Landsat was had in science and what he hopes to see as the mission continues.