Global Land Ice Velocity Extraction from Landsat 8 (GoLIVE), Version 1
Data set id:
NSIDC-0710
DOI: 10.7265/N5ZP442B
This is the most recent version of these data.
Version Summary
Initial release

Overview

This data set is a compilation of ice velocity mappings generated from pairs of Landsat 8 panchromatic images acquired from May 2013 to present covering all terrestrial permanent ice within the latitude range 82°S to 82°N that is larger than 5 km2 in area. The data are updated monthly with new images acquired by Landsat 8 that are then paired with older images acquired within 400 days of the new acquisition for the Antarctic ice sheet, 112 days for the Greenland ice sheet, and 96 days for all other glacierized areas. The data are generated by an image correlation algorithm that produces grids of ice displacement referenced to in-image rock outcrops, slow moving ice, or if lacking that, using the satellite's geo-positioning (accurate to +/- 5 m). Velocity vector grids are generated at a sample spacing of 300 m from small sub-images that are either 300 m or 600 m on a side, depending on the region. For example, ice sheet areas are mapped with 600 m x 600 m sub-images, and mountain glaciers are mapped with 300 m x 300 m sub-images. Accuracy of the velocity data varies depending on the time separation between the images, ranging between ~1 m/d per day to 0.02 m/d per day.
Parameter(s):
GLACIER MOTION/ICE SHEET MOTIONICE VELOCITY
Platform(s):
LANDSAT-8
Sensor(s):
OLI
Data Format(s):
NetCDF, PNG, GeoTIFF
Temporal Coverage:
1 May 2013 to 30 April 2017
Temporal Resolution:
  • 16 day
Spatial Resolution:
  • 300 m
  • 300 m
Spatial Coverage:
N:
82
S:
-82
E:
180
W:
-180
Blue outlined yellow areas on the map below indicate the spatial coverage for this data set.

Data Access & Tools

Help Articles

How to Articles

The GoLIVE Map Application allows users to spatially search for and download land ice velocities derived from panchromatic imagery collected from May 2013 to present.
The NSIDC Data Map Services Application Programming Interface (API) provides HTTP URLs for requesting geo-registered map images from NSIDC's geospatial database. A WMS request defines the geographic layer(s) and area of interest to be processed.
This article illustrates the how to convert NetCDF variables to single-band GeoTIFFs. You will need to have the Geospatial Data Abstraction Library (GDAL, http://gdal.org/) installed on your system before continuing.