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Full catalog/AV3_L2A_RFL_2357
AV3_L2A_RFL_2357·v1·dataset

True surface color, fine detail (AVIRIS-3)

AVIRIS-3 L2A Orthocorrected Surface Reflectance, Facility Instrument Collection
land NASA ORNL_CLOUD Level 2 active multiple
In plain English

What it measures. Detailed maps of true surface color and brightness across hundreds of narrow color bands from visible light into the shortwave infrared, with the atmosphere's effects removed.

How it's made. Collected by the airborne AVIRIS-3 imaging spectrometer flown on a B-200 aircraft; raw light measurements were converted into ground-level reflectance and corrected for terrain and map position.

How & where you'd use it. Used to study vegetation, minerals, water, and other surface features in fine spectral detail for environmental and geological research.

What's measured

LAND SURFACE › SURFACE RADIATIVE PROPERTIES › REFLECTANCESPECTRAL/ENGINEERING › INFRARED WAVELENGTHS › REFLECTED INFRARED

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2023-07-05 → ongoing
  • Measured byB-200 (AVIRIS-3)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • Spatial extent-178.68, 16.5, -66.18, 72.6
  • Formatsmultiple
  • StatusACTIVE

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

This dataset contains Level 2A (L2A) surface reflectance images from the Airborne Visible / Infrared Imaging Spectrometer-3 (AVIRIS-3) instrument. This is the NASA Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) facility instrument archive of these data. The NASA AVIRIS-3 is a spectral mapping system that measures reflected radiance at 7.4-nm intervals in the Visible to Shortwave Infrared (VSWIR) spectral range from 390-2500 nm. Surface hemispherical directional reflectance was derived from calibrated radiance using an optimal estimation algorithm. For each flight line, two file types are included: orthocorrected surface reflectance (RFL_ORT) and orthocorrected reflectance uncertainty (UNC_ORT) in netCDF format. Both file types include data projected in a UTM coordinate system. In addition, ancillary files for each flight line are provided, including a quick look image in GeoTIFF format and text files in YAML format that document processing algorithms and parameters used during production.

Get the data

av3_l2a_rfl_2357_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="AV3_L2A_RFL_2357",
    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 ORNL_CLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.