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Full catalog/amsua17sp
amsua17sp·v1·dataset

Microwave temperature soundings of the air (NOAA-17)

ADVANCED MICROWAVE SOUNDING UNIT-A (AMSU-A) SWATH FROM NOAA-17
land NASA GHRC_DAAC Level 2 netCDF-3HDF-EOS2
In plain English

What it measures. Microwave readings used to profile air temperature and moisture from the surface up to about 45 km, recorded across 15 channels along the satellite's swath.

How it's made. Collected by the AMSU-A passive microwave radiometer on the NOAA-17 satellite, packaged into daily files with location and time for each measurement.

How & where you'd use it. A core input for weather forecasting and atmospheric studies, providing temperature and humidity structure of the atmosphere day and night, even through clouds.

What's measured

Spectral/Engineering › Microwave › Brightness TemperatureAtmosphere › Atmospheric Temperature › Upper Air Temperature › Vertical ProfilesAtmosphere › Atmospheric Water Vapor › Water Vapor Profiles

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2002-07-21 → 2003-12-13
  • Measured byNOAA-17 (AMSU-A)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • Spatial extent-180, -89.575, 180, 89.629
  • FormatsnetCDF-3, HDF-EOS2
  • StatusCOMPLETE

What you can do with it

  • Track deforestation, fire scars and land-cover change
  • Monitor crop and vegetation health (NDVI/EVI)
  • Map how built-up vs. green an area is over time
Official description

AMSU-A, the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, is a 15-channel passive microwave radiometer used to profile atmospheric temperature and moisture from the earth's surface to ~45 km (3 millibars). All orbits beginning in the day (00:00:00 - 23:59:59 UTC) are stored in one daily HDF-EOS file. Each file contains 15 (channel) arrays, as well as corresponding latitude, longitude, and time. AMSU flies on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) polar orbiting spacecraft as part of the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS). The Third Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A was launched on NOAA-17 on 24 June 2002 from Vandenberg AFB, California on a Titan II booster.

Get the data

amsua17sp_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="amsua17sp",
    version="1",
    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 GHRC_DAAC
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.