True surface color, near-real-time (Terra MODIS)
What it measures. The true color of the land surface across seven wavelengths, corrected to show how it would appear at ground level without atmospheric interference, available in near-real-time.
How it's made. Generated from the MODIS land bands on the Terra satellite by removing the effects of atmospheric scattering and absorption.
How & where you'd use it. Serves as the foundational input for products such as vegetation indices, snow and ice mapping, and fire detection; typically used to build those higher-level products.
What's measured
Coverage & cadence
- Time span2021-02-07 → ongoing
- Measured byTerra (MODIS)
- Processing levelLevel 2
- Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
- FormatsHDF-EOS
- 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
The MODIS/Terra Near Real Time (NRT) L2 Surface Reflectance, 5-Min Swath 250m, 500m, and 1km (MOD09) product is computed from the MODIS Level 1B land bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 (centered at 648 nm, 858 nm, 470 nm, 555 nm, 1240 nm, 1640 nm, and 2130 nm, respectively). This product is an estimate of the surface spectral reflectance for each band as it would have been measured at ground level if there were no atmospheric scattering or absorption. The surface-reflectance product is the input for product generation for several land products: vegetation Indices (VIs), BRDF, thermal anomaly, snow/ice, and Fraction of Photosynthetically Active Radiation/Leaf Area Index (FPAR/LAI).
Get the data
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc") # free Earthdata Login
results = earthaccess.search_data(
short_name="MOD09",
version="6.1NRT",
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 LANCEMODISBrowsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.