Landsat GeoCover at the Global Land Cover Facility

Editions of Imagery

There are three editions of this imagery: the 1975 edition, with imagery collected from 1972-1983, the 1990 edition, with imagery collected from 1989-1993, and the 2000 edition, with imagery collected between 1997 and 2000. While Landsat satellites are capable of collecting any scene on the planet every sixteen days, there were historically poor acquisition records and the further issue of cloud cover restricting the availability of actual imagery for the collection. The result of these issues is the ranges in dates as stated above. In addition to the differences in time between the editions, the 1975 edition provides imagery collected from the MSS sensor, the 1990 edition provides imagery from the TM sensor, and the 2000 edition provides imagery from the ETM+ sensor; all of which were mounted on Landsat satellites.

Availability All Landsat GeoCover is available from the GLCF, MDA Federal, and the USGS EROS Data Center. The GLCF provides free access to the collection via FTP. Review the Table of Countries and Status to determine delivery of Landsat GeoCover to individual countries.

Ownership of Landsat GeoCover datasets All Landsat imagery is ultimately the property of the citizens of the United States. NASA holds the copyright for Landsat imagery, and shares the copyright with the USGS for the Landsat GeoCover datasets. There is no restriction on the use of Landsat GeoCover imagery for research, educational or commercial purposes. Users are asked to credit the sources, including NASA, EarthSat (for orthorectification), and the GLCF.

Further information about Landsat imagery Please review the Landsat Project at NASA or the Landsat 7 Science Handbook for further information regarding Landsat. EarthSat has further information regarding GeoCover itself.