Spectral Reflectance Newsletter #14

Weekly newsletter on Earth Observation

Level-2 News

NASA contracts SpaceX for launch services for Sentinel-6B Mission [link]
“NASA has selected SpaceX to provide launch services for the Sentinel-6B mission. Sentinel-6B will continue the long-term global sea level data record begun in 1992 by Topex/Poseidon followed by Jason 1, 2, 3, and Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich. The mission is a partnership between NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, ESA (European Space Agency), and the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites.”

A look ahead at the Alaska Satellite Facility [YouTube]
In this video, the Alaska Satellite Facility Chief Scientist Franz Meyer talks about the NISAR mission and the ASF’s role in education training and product creation, as well as a project called OPERA to create large scale high level data products from SAR.

Dataset

Samples of manually labeled data available in CloudSEN12. [link]

CloudSEN12; A Benchmark Dataset for Cloud Semantic Understanding [link]
“CloudSEN12 is a LARGE dataset (~1 TB) for cloud semantic understanding that consists of 49,400 image patches (IP) that are evenly spread throughout all continents except Antarctica. Each IP covers 5090 x 5090 meters and contains data from Sentinel-2 levels 1C and 2A, hand-crafted annotations of thick and thin clouds and cloud shadows, Sentinel-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), digital elevation model, surface water occurrence, land cover classes, and cloud mask results from six cutting-edge cloud detection algorithms.”

Related:
CloudSEN12 with Cesar Aybar [link]
Check this video where Robin Cole has a chat with Cesar Aybar, lead-creator of CloudSEN12.

CloudSEN12, a global dataset for semantic understanding of cloud and cloud shadow in Sentinel-2 (paper) [link]

KappaSet: Sentinel-2 KappaZeta Cloud and Cloud Shadow Masks [link]
Check KappaSet, listed on this newsletter a few weeks ago.

Interesting reads

“The flood extent and depth in Richmond and Windsor, Australia, as parts of the Greater Sydney area received about eight months of rain in four days in early 2022.” Credit: ICEYE

Hurricane season 2022: The power of near real-time flood observation data [link]
Read about how ICEYE observed this year’s storms and captured flood extent as a way for insurance companies to manage their exposure to flood risk.

The State of Commercial Earth Observation: 2022 Edition [link]
Aravind Ravichandran created some amazing infographics capturing the state of the EO market and the different layers in which companies operate. Read his perspective on what’s missing to make satellite mainstream.

“Predicted log(CaO) interpolated from stream sediment geochemistry observations across the UK using auxiliary information provided by a digital elevation model.”

Geological mapping in the age of artificial intelligence [link]
Two centuries on from the publication of Britain’s first geological maps, Charlie Kirkwood makes the case for AI mapping systems! Read this interesting article for how they used a deep learning-based method to map geological properties using geochemical survey data with SRTM elevation data as auxiliary information.

Learning

ARSET — Connecting Citizen Science with Remote Sensing [link]
“This training will provide attendees an overview of citizen science efforts that use Earth Observations, and how to engage with community members in a supportive and meaningful manner to achieve project goals.”

The training includes three, 1.5-hour sessions within the dates: January 24, 2023 — January 31, 2023.