Daily atmosphere conditions, helper data (AIRS, 1°)
What it measures. A daily, gridded set of supporting atmospheric fields, things like inputs and intermediate values that go alongside the main AIRS atmosphere products.
How it's made. Derived from the AIRS infrared sounder on the Aqua satellite, averaged into a 1-degree daily grid; note these are helper fields that aren't fully quality-checked.
How & where you'd use it. Mainly for researchers who need the extra behind-the-scenes fields; the values can include unvalidated data, so they are used with care rather than as a headline product.
What's measured
Coverage & cadence
- Time span2002-08-31 → ongoing
- Measured byAqua (AIRS)
- Processing levelLevel 3
- Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
- StatusACTIVE
What you can do with it
- Map air pollutants — NO₂, aerosols, ozone
- Track greenhouse gases and Earth's energy budget
- Feed weather and air-quality analysis
Official description
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) is a grating spectrometer (R = 1200) aboard the second Earth Observing System (EOS) polar-orbiting platform, EOS Aqua. In combination with the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU) and the Humidity Sounder for Brazil (HSB), AIRS constitutes an innovative atmospheric sounding group of visible, infrared, and microwave sensors. The L3 support products are similar to the L3 standard products but contain fields which are not fully validated, or are inputs or intermediary values. Because no quality control information is available for some of these fields, values from failed retrievals may be included. The value for each grid box is the sum of the values that fall within the 1x1 area divided by the number of points in the box.
Get the data
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc") # free Earthdata Login
results = earthaccess.search_data(
short_name="AIRS3SPD",
version="7.0",
bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9), # your area (W,S,E,N)
temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"), # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results) # stream straight from GES_DISC Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package. Official links
- Access the data via HTTP. GET DATA
- Access the data via the OPeNDAP protocol. USE SERVICE API
- Use the Earthdata Search to find and retrieve data sets across multiple data centers. GET DATA
- AIRS Documentation Page VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- Overview of the AIRS Mission: Instruments, Processing Algorithms, Products, and Documentation VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- AIRS Version 7 Level 3 Product User Guide VIEW RELATED INFORMATION