Legacy remote sensing

Question 1

When was the first true colour image of earth taken?

Answer 1

1967 - from the ATS satellite

Question 2

Why is legacy RS important?

Answer 2

provide multi decadal records vital for understanding climate change (stretches record of geophysical change back to early 1900s), there is a lot of remotely sensed data from pre 2000s, still large quantities of data to be processed

Question 3

What is the timeline of legacy RS

Answer 3

• Early 1900s onwards: aerial
  photography
• 1960-late 1980s: Declassified Spy
  satellite data
• Early 1960s onwards: Early weather
  satellites e.g. Nimbus
• 1972 onwards: Landsat program
• 1978 SeaSat: First civilian SAR
  satellite

Question 4

SPy satellites, what is the context?

Answer 4

cold war

Question 5

when was the first soviet satellite put into orbit?

Answer 5

Sputnik in orbit in 1957

Question 6

What is the corona satellite program?

Answer 6

USA spy satellite programme

Question 7

How much film did each coronna satellite carry?

Answer 7

9600m

Question 8

What was the orbital range of the coronna satellites?

Answer 8

165 - 460km

Question 9

WHat was the ground resolution of the the coronna images?

Answer 9

2.5 - 40m

Question 10

Mention a common limitation of the corona images

Answer 10

cloud cover

Question 11

What cameras were used for corona?

Answer 11

early missions - panoramic camera
later missions carries forward and aft facing cameras for stereo imagery

Question 12

When was the corona programme declassified?

Answer 12

1995

Question 13

When was the programme top secret until?

Answer 13

1992

Question 14

Where have corona images been applied?

Answer 14

forestry mapping, lake size monitoring, DEM differencing, archeaology (mexico city urban sprawl now covers)

Question 15

What does the nimbus program record?

Answer 15

climate variables

Question 16

What did Nimbus 7 provide?

Answer 16

Rgular reliable estimates of sea-ice extent from its Electrically Scanning Microwave
Radiometer instrument between 1978 and 1987

Question 17

What was the spatial resolution of Landsat 1

Answer 17

60m

Question 18

What was the first Landsat 1 image of?

Answer 18

Dallas Texas, 1972

Question 19

What did Landsat 1 provide?

Answer 19

The first detailed view of the earth. and an image of a huge forest fire in remote Alaska

Question 20

What is the T1 T2 seperation in the Landsat programme?

Answer 20

T1 geolocation accuracy is <12m and T2 is > 12m
(it’s identified in the product name)

Question 21

problems early with landsat imagery

Answer 21

• • Geolocation accuracy
    (problematic at the
    poles for earlier satellites
    because of lack of control
    points)
• Extensive manual co-registration required
• Tie images to stable features
• Often not fully utilised

Question 22

Applications of landsat

Answer 22

forest distrubance across USA, human settelements across world over 40 years, Antarctic mass balance, winter wetland changes, detecting earlier snowmelt, decadal slowdown of land terminating sector of the greenland ice sheet,

Question 23

what is Sea Sat

Answer 23

first civilian SAR satellite

Question 24

What instruments did SeaSat contain?

Answer 24

altimeter, scaterometter, sacnning multi channel microwave radiometer, SAR, Visible and IR radiometer