How fast glaciers and ice sheets flow (ITS_LIVE) — NSIDC-0776

In plain English

What it measures. How fast glaciers and ice sheets are sliding across major ice-covered regions, given as average yearly surface speeds plus long-term averages.

How it's made. Calculated by tracking how surface features shift between satellite images from the Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2, and several Landsat satellites, compiled by NASA's ITS_LIVE project.

How & where you'd use it. Speeds reveal how ice is responding to a warming climate and how much it may contribute to sea-level rise, spanning 1985 to 2022.

What's measured

CRYOSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › ICE VELOCITY

Coverage & cadence

Time span1984-01-01 → 2022-12-31
Measured byLANDSAT-4 (TM) · LANDSAT-5 (TM) · LANDSAT-7 (ETM+) · LANDSAT-8 (OLI) · LANDSAT-9 (OLI-2) · Sentinel-1A (C-SAR) · Sentinel-1B (C-SAR) · Sentinel-2A (Sentinel-2 MSI) · Sentinel-2B (Sentinel-2 MSI)
Processing levelLevel 3
Spatial extent-171.53, 51.05, -124.51, 65.04
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 from the Inter-Mission Time Series of Land Ice Velocity and Elevation (ITS_LIVE) project, part of NASA's Making Earth System Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) Program, consists of regionally compiled, mean annual surface velocities, plus climatological means, for major glacier-covered regions. Velocities are derived from imagery acquired by the Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 and Landsat 4, 5, 7, 8, and 9 satellites. Data are available from 1985 to 2022, with nearly complete annual coverage provided after 2013.

Get the data

nsidc-0776_access.py

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

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="NSIDC-0776",
    version="2",
    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.

What's measured

Coverage & cadence

What you can do with it

Get the data

Official links