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Full catalog/NSIDC-0761
NSIDC-0761·v1·dataset

How fast the Antarctic ice sheet flows

MEaSUREs Multi-year Reference Velocity Maps of the Antarctic Ice Sheet V001
cryosphere NASA NSIDC_CPRD Level 3 netCDF-4
In plain English

What it measures. Maps of how fast and in which direction Antarctica's ice is flowing, at 450-meter detail, for four time periods between 1995 and 2022. Each map also includes uncertainty estimates and markers for the ice edge and grounding line.

How it's made. Created by tracking how surface features and radar signals shift between repeat satellite passes, combining radar from many satellites with visible images from Landsat 8.

How & where you'd use it. Lets scientists see how the Antarctic ice sheet is moving and changing over decades, which matters for understanding ice loss and future sea-level rise.

What's measured

CRYOSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › ICE VELOCITY

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span1995-07-01 → 2001-06-30
  • Measured byALOS (PALSAR) · ENVISAT (ASAR) · ERS-1 (SAR) · ERS-2 (SAR) · LANDSAT-8 (OLI) · RADARSAT-1 (SAR) · RADARSAT-2 (SAR) · Sentinel-1A (C-SAR) · Sentinel-1B (C-SAR) · TDX (X-SAR) · TSX (X-SAR)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, -60
  • FormatsnetCDF-4
  • StatusCOMPLETE

What you can do with it

  • Measure sea ice, snow cover and glaciers
  • Watch ice-sheet elevation change
  • Track freeze/thaw and permafrost
Official description

This data set, part of the NASA Making Earth System Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) Program, contains four, as-complete-as-possible 450 m resolution reference maps of ice component velocities for the Antarctic ice sheet. Maps are available for 1995 – 2001; 2007 – 2009; 2014 – 2017; and 2020 – 2022. Velocities are derived by applying phase analysis and speckle tracking to satellite synthetic aperture radar data, and by feature tracking of visible imagery obtained by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on board Landsat-8. Data also include velocity standard deviation and mean velocity standard error; the number of observation pairs used for each pixel; start and end dates used for each pixel; and a mask that indicates ice front and grounding line locations.

Get the data

nsidc-0761_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="NSIDC-0761",
    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.