Hand-dug snow pit measurements over time (SnowEx 2020) — SNEX20_TS_SP

In plain English

What it measures. These are detailed measurements from hand-dug snow pits, repeated over time at the same areas to track how the snowpack changes through a season. The collection also includes photos of field notes and the pit sites.

How it's made. Field teams in the SnowEx 2020 campaign dug and measured 454 snow pits across California, Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, and Utah between October 2019 and May 2020.

How & where you'd use it. These ground measurements help validate and improve satellite and airborne snow estimates, and support research on snowpack and water supply.

What's measured

TERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › LIQUID WATER CONTENTTERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › SNOW DENSITYTERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › SNOW DEPTHTERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › GLACIERS/ICE SHEETS › FIRN › SNOW GRAIN SIZETERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › SNOW/ICE TEMPERATURETERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › SNOW STRATIGRAPHYTERRESTRIAL HYDROSPHERE › SNOW/ICE › SNOW WATER EQUIVALENT

Coverage & cadence

Time span2019-10-24 → 2020-05-20
Measured byGROUND-BASED OBSERVATIONS (A2 Photonic_WISe, GPS, MICROSCOPES, SNOW DENSITY CUTTER, THERMOMETERS)
Processing levelLevel 2
Spatial extent-120.29897, 35.85794, -105.54616, 44.30455
FormatsPDF, JPEG, CSV, Excel
StatusCOMPLETE

What you can do with it

Follow rainfall, floods and surface-water extent
Track soil moisture and the onset of drought
Monitor lakes, rivers and groundwater storage

Official description

The data set is a time-series of snow pit measurements obtained by the SnowEx community during the 2020 campaign. Between October 2019 and May 2020, data were collected from 454 snow pits at 12 regional locations throughout California, Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, and Utah, USA. At each of the locations, between 1 and 11 sites covering a range of conditions (terrains, snow depths, etc.) were chosen for weekly snow pit observations. Also available are photos of the field notes and snow pit sites.

Get the data

snex20_ts_sp_access.py

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

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="SNEX20_TS_SP",
    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.

Official links

Search and order NASA Earth Science data using spatial and temporal filters. Reformatting, reprojecting, and subsetting options are available for some data sets. GET DATA
Quickly download a few files using a web browser, or access data through a command-line utility such as WGET. GET DATA
Search data by spatial and/or temporal ranges or file name. Choose from various download options, including a Python script. GET DATA
A Python library to search and access NASA Earth science data with just a few lines of code GET DATA
Find more data access options and help resources. VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
SnowEx20 Time Series Snow Pit Measurements, Version 2 User Guide VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
SnowEx20_TS_SP Parameter Summary Graphs VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
SNEX20_TS_SP Snow Pit Sheet Template Explanation VIEW RELATED INFORMATION