IceBridge 2010, Antarctica

In Fall 2010, LVIS co-mounted on the NASA DC-8 aircraft along with other Icebridge Sensors performed dedicated high-altitude, flights in Antarctica for the calibration and validation of NASA's ICESat sensor. Data are available in both Level1B and Level2 formats. The Level1b data files contain the geolocated laser waveform data for each laser footprint. The Level2 data files contain elevations of reflecting surfaces derived from the Level1b data.


Level 2 files are much smaller and more manageable. For those users not familiar with waveform lidar data, we recommend that you start with the Level2 files before moving to the Level1b files (e.g., for context or to apply different algorithms). The Level1B data are in HDF5 and the Level2 data are in ascii.


Use the python code posted here to view the data products from this mission.



A description of the data products from this mission, along with their use for calibrating data from the ICESat sensor is:

Estimation of ICESat intercampaign elevation biases from comparison of lidar data in East Antarctica
Hofton, M. A. and Luthcke, S. B. and Blair, J. B.  Geophysical Research Letters,  40, issue 21,  5698-5703,  2013.  10.1002/2013GL057652

LVIS Mission Information

LVIS Lidar
Instrument Version: LVIS
Flight Platform: NASA DC-8
Nominal Flight Altitude: 40,000'
Nominal LVIS Swath Width: 2.4km
Nominal LVIS Footprint Diameter: 20m

Resources

Data Products

LVIS Data Products Format Download Location
Flight TrajectoriesKMZThis page
LVIS L1B Geolocated WaveformsHDF, LDS 1.04NSIDC1, NASA EarthData
LVIS L2 Elevation and Height ProductsASCII TXT, LDS 1.04NSIDC1, NASA EarthData

1 At NSIDC, search for date ranges 01 Nov 2010 through 30 Nov 2010



Display MJD Date Region / Remarks Platform Flight Trajectory
55504 04 Nov 2010 Pole Hole 1 DC-8 [JPEG] [PDF] [kmz] [shp]
55510 10 Nov 2010 Pole Hole 2 DC-8 [JPEG] [PDF] [kmz] [shp]
Nov 2010 All Antarctic 2010 Flights DC-8 [kmz] [shp]