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Full catalog/NmTHIR115-1T
NmTHIR115-1T·v1·dataset

Old infrared weather imagery (Nimbus, grayscale)

Nimbus Temperature-Humidity Infrared Radiometer 11.5 µm Grayscale Swath Data L1, TIFF V001
land NASA NSIDC_CPRD Level 1 TIFF
In plain English

What it measures. Daily black-and-white images showing how warm surfaces and cloud tops looked in a specific infrared band, from the early 1970s.

How it's made. Created from the THIR infrared radiometer on the Nimbus 4, 5, and 6 satellites and saved as grayscale TIFF images; note the images are not georeferenced and have some gaps.

How & where you'd use it. Mainly valuable as a historical record of early weather and cloud observations for studying long-term change.

What's measured

SPECTRAL/ENGINEERING › INFRARED WAVELENGTHS › INFRARED IMAGERY

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span1970-04-08 → 1971-04-08
  • Measured byNimbus-4 (THIR) · Nimbus-5 (THIR) · Nimbus-6 (THIR)
  • Processing levelLevel 1
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
  • FormatsTIFF
  • 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

This data set consists of daily, global grayscale TIFF images derived from radiative temperatures measured in the 11.5 µm window (10.5 µm - 12.5 µm). These data were detected by the Temperature-Humidity Infrared Radiometer (THIR) on board the Nimbus 4, Nimbus 5, and Nimbus 6 satellites, respectively, during 1970-1971, 1973-1975 and 1975. The Nimbus satellites used the THIR 11.5 µm window to measure cloud top or surface temperatures. Note: This data set is not georeferenced and contains some gaps in temporal coverage because of missing data.

Get the data

nmthir115-1t_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="NmTHIR115-1T",
    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 NSIDC_CPRD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.