Medium Resolution Satellite Imagery of Australia from DMCii

Brief description

The Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC) is a constellation of satellites (presently eight) owned by various countries; operating together to provide frequent observations of the Earth for monitoring natural disasters.
The DMC satellites operate in the visible to near-infra-red part of the spectrum, which makes them very useful for crop and forest monitoring as well as general earth observation.
DMC satellites have been used in emergency response in Australia, providing daily images of the progress of floods through Queensland and New South Wales during the February 2012 flood event.
DMC imagery is also used to augment data acquired from the Landsat series of satellites. The DMC SLIM-6-22 sensor has a slightly higher spatial resolution of 22 metres and a higher revisit rate of four days; compared to Landsat 5 TM sensor with a spatial resolution of 30 metres and a revisit rate of 16 days. In addition the dual sensor layout on the satellites allows a 620 kilometre wide swath to be acquired in a single pass. DMC satellites have three spectral bands: green, red and near infra-red; where seven bands are available from Landsat 5 TM data.
Comparisons of the current generation of DMC satellites with Landsat-7 ETM+ have demonstrated that the calibration accuracy is within 1 - 3%. To maintain the calibration the DMC satellites are routinely cross-calibrated with Landsat-7 ETM+.
Landsat-5 was a key source of imagery throughout the world; until the acquisitions of imagery was suspended in 2011. To address the shortfall in access to medium resolution data, Geoscience Australia has acquired large regional coverage of DMC data from DMC Imaging International (DMCii). This acquisition will help to address monitoring needs until Landsat-8 imagery is available in mid-2013.

Lineage

Maintenance and Update Frequency: notPlanned

Statement: Unknown