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Full catalog/VJ129
VJ129·v2·dataset

Where there's sea ice (NOAA-20, 375 m)

VIIRS/JPSS1 Sea Ice Cover 6-Min L2 Swath 375m V002
cryosphere NASA NSIDC_CPRD Level 2 active netCDF-4
In plain English

What it measures. Shows where sea ice is present, mapped at 375 m detail along the satellite track.

How it's made. Derived from VIIRS sensor readings on the NOAA-20 (JPSS-1) satellite, using a snow/ice index following the MODIS approach.

How & where you'd use it. Supports monitoring of sea ice extent for navigation, climate studies and polar research.

What's measured

CRYOSPHERE › SEA ICE

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2018-01-05 → ongoing
  • Measured byJPSS-1 (VIIRS) · NOAA-20 (VIIRS)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
  • FormatsnetCDF-4
  • StatusACTIVE

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 reports the location of sea ice cover derived from radiance data acquired by the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) onboard the Joint Polar Satellite System's first satellite (JPSS-1). Following the approach used by MODIS, sea ice is detected using the Normalized Difference Snow Index.

Get the data

vj129_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="VJ129",
    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.