Alaska Satellite Facility

ASF home graphic dish with satellite above and aurora in the sky

Headlines

Below is a collection of headlines, notices, and archived newsletters from the Alaska Satellite Facility’s News & Notes. View the latest newsletters below, and for training notices click here.

Sentinel-1 data file size increases

A result of the transition made by ESA to its new Copernicus Data Space Ecosystem is that Sentinel-1 data files are no longer compressed. Therefore, all Sentinel-1 data files available from ASF since September 26, 2023, are larger by as much as 60%. The effect of this is that some files will take longer to download than you have come to expect. And, depending on the quality of your internet connection, this may result in incomplete file transfers if the download connection times out before the transfer is complete. If you suspect that this may have occurred, please try the download again.

ESA is aware of this issue and hopes to have a solution by the end of this year. In the meantime, ASF is exploring options we can implement until this permanent solution is in place.

We will update this announcement as additional information becomes available. For questions, contact ASF User Support at [email protected]

17 October 2023

Update 23 October 2023
Some users are reporting that Sentinel-1 data available through the Copernicus Data Space Ecosystem (and therefore from ASF) are no longer compatible with the Sentinel-1 Toolbox (SNAP).

Update 24 October 2023
From ESA in the Copernicus Community Forum:
https://helpcenter.dataspace.copernicus.eu/hc/en-gb/community/posts/14291173131293
“In the last month we have detected some incidents that did not occur before:
1) The size of the images in .zip format has doubled.
2) SNAP does not show swath 3 data when trying to open from the zip file. However, if the zip file is previously unzipped, the swath 3 data does exist and can be manually loaded into SNAP”

radarsat-1 antarctica mosaic

NASA announces that RADARSAT-1 data are Open Data at ASF

NASA has announced that all RADARSAT-1 data archived at the Alaska Satellite Facility Distributed Active Archive Center (ASF DAAC) are ...
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jaxa mosaic

Global SAR Mosaic Datasets Available from JAXA

Explore the Earth like never before with Global Mosaics and Maps created from data acquired by the JERS-1 (1992-98), ALOS ...
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The ASF antennas atop the Geophysical Institute and in the woods on the West Ridge of the UAF campus.

ASF Receives New NASA Contract Award

The Alaska Satellite Facility was recently awarded NASA’s Earth Radar Data Operations Management contract for another 5 years. The continued ...
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screenshot of vertex in spanish

ASF Vertex Data Search is now available in Spanish!

In response to many requests from our users, the powerful Vertex search application is now available in a Spanish version. ...
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ASF OpenScienceLab featured this month

The NASA Earthdata website currently highlights OpenSciecneLab (OSL) in its Data Tool in Focus section. OSL is an ASF service ...
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ARIA GUNW interferogram

JPL uses data from ASF for the ARIA Project

The JPL/CalTech ARIA Project utilizes SAR data and GPS for detecting and measuring ground deformation and creating predictive models. Cloud-based ...
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gun-w interferogram over turkey

ALOS-2 PALSAR-2 data available over the Turkey/Syria earthquake region

ALOS-2 PALSAR-2 ScanSAR L1.1 (SLC, full-aperture focusing) products acquired over the area of the recent Turkey/Syria earthquakes are now freely available ...
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On Demand Sentinel-1 RTC is now available at 10-m pixel spacing and in dB scale!

The Alaska Satellite Facility (ASF) has released new processing options for On Demand Sentinel-1 Radiometric Terrain Correction (RTC). RTC products can now be ...
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Sentinel-1 Satellite

Sentinel-1B satellite mission ends

The European Space Agency announced today that efforts to repair the failed C-band SAR sensor onboard the Sentinel-1B satellite have ...
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Heat Map of Interferometric coherence of SAR Data in Ascending Orbit

ASF Science Friday series continues August 26

Monthly Lecture ASF is playing an increasing role in support of NASA’s Earth Science mission. A monthly lecture series features ...
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Opera workshop aerial image of meandering river

NASA schedules second OPERA workshop

NASA and JPL will host a second OPERA project workshop on September 2, 2022. Participation is available in-person or virtually. ...
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Image from Sentinel-1 reveal changes in the Earth's surface over one year

Sentinel-1 images reveal changes in the Earth’s surface over one year

A new set of satellite radar derived images provide a novel view of the face of Earth in unprecedented detail, ...
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