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Full catalog/CAL_LID_L2_PSCMask-Standard-V3-00
CAL_LID_L2_PSCMask-Standard-V3-00·vV3-00·dataset

Where icy high-altitude polar clouds form (CALIPSO)

CALIPSO Lidar Level 2 Polar Stratospheric Cloud (PSC), V3-00
atmosphere NASA LARC_CLOUD Level 2 HDF4
In plain English

What it measures. Where high-altitude polar stratospheric clouds form, along with their location, height, optical properties, and what they are made of — icy clouds tied to ozone destruction over the poles.

How it's made. Built from the CALIOP laser instrument (a lidar) on the CALIPSO satellite, which profiles the atmosphere in fine vertical detail, supplemented with water-vapor and weather data from the Aura satellite.

How & where you'd use it. Helps scientists study the clouds involved in polar ozone loss and how aerosols and clouds shape climate and weather at the poles.

What's measured

ATMOSPHERE › CLOUDS › CLOUD TYPESATMOSPHERE › AEROSOLSATMOSPHERE › AEROSOLS › AEROSOL OPTICAL DEPTH/THICKNESSATMOSPHERE › AEROSOLS › AEROSOL BACKSCATTERSPECTRAL/ENGINEERING › LIDAR › LIDAR DEPOLARIZATION RATIOATMOSPHERE › AEROSOLS › AEROSOL EXTINCTIONATMOSPHERE › ATMOSPHERIC RADIATION › SCATTERINGATMOSPHERE › CLOUDS › STRATOSPHERIC CLOUDS (OBSERVED/ANALYZED) › POLAR STRATOSPHERIC CLOUDS/NACREOUSATMOSPHERE › ATMOSPHERIC WATER VAPOR › WATER VAPOR PROFILES › WATER VAPOR MIXING RATIO PROFILES

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2006-06-12 → 2023-06-30
  • Measured byCALIPSO (CALIOP)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • FormatsHDF4
  • StatusCOMPLETE

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

CAL_LID_L2_PSCMask-Standard-V3-00 is the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation (CALIPSO) Lidar Level 2 Polar Stratospheric Clouds (PSC) data product. This data product was collected using the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) instrument and describes the spatial distribution, optical properties, and composition of PSC layers observed. The product contains profiles of PSC presence, composition, optical properties, and meteorological information on a uniform 5-km horizontal x 180-m vertical grid along CALIPSO orbit tracks. Aura Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) measurements of the primary PSC condensable vapors HNO3 and H2O and a number of parameters from the Aura MLS V2 Derived Meteorological Products (DMPs) are also included in this product. CALIPSO was a partnership between NASA and the French Space Agency, CNES. CALIPSO was launched on April 28, 2006 to study the many roles played by clouds and aerosols in Earth’s climate and weather. It flew in the international A-Train constellation for coincident Earth observations from launch until September 13, 2018, when CALIPSO began lowering its orbit from 705 km to 688 km (428 miles) above the Earth to resume formation flying with CloudSat as part of the “C-Train”. The CALIPSO satellite carried three remote sensing instruments: the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP), the Imaging Infrared Radiometer (IIR), and the Wide Field-of-View Camera (WFC). By mutual agreement between NASA and CNES, the CALIPSO science mission concluded on August 1, 2023.

Get the data

cal_lid_l2_pscmask-standard-v3-00_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="CAL_LID_L2_PSCMask-Standard-V3-00",
    version="V3-00",
    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 LARC_CLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.