If any of the new features described below are causing problems then
please notify the webmaster.
First - What is NEODAAS?
- In a partnership with Plymouth Marine Laboratory's Remote
Sensing Data Analysis Service, Dundee Satellite Receiving Station is pleased
to announce the launch of NEODAAS, the NERC Earth Observation Data
Acquisition and Analysis Service. For more details please see the
NEODAAS web site.
The first main benefit is the seamless access to both Dundee and Plymouth
products simply by registering at one or the other site.
News
- Job vacancies in NEODAAS at
Plymouth and
Dundee.
- The cloudmask product is available for AVHRR passes: an image can be
viewed of the cloud cover for each pass, and when a search is performed
(with the "complex" option selected)
a percentage cloud cover is displayed.
The percentage is valid for the location around the point selected, not
for the image as a whole, making it useful when trying to exclude passes
where the chosen location is cloudy.
- 7 September 2007: The new image gallery has been
launched.
- September 2007: Dundee-registered users now have seamless access to the
products produced from Dundee data by Plymouth Marine Laboratory.
When browsing the list of passes for one day a link to PML will be shown.
Following the link enables access to AVHRR and MODIS products for the UK
and other areas. Sea Surface Temperature and Chlorophyll are two of the
products which are produced in Plymouth from data received in Dundee.
- 24 November 2006: The volcano Mount Etna erupts again. The smoke plume is seen in a wonderful image from the Aqua satellite; see the
interesting images page.
- 25 October 2006: After 6 attempts MetOp was launched on 19 October and transmitted its first MetOp-AVHRR image at 08:00 this morning. However it will take a few months before the satellite is fully operational.
- A new page for viewing Geostationary Satellite Images has been created.
If you have bookmarks to the old pages they will still work but the new pages
should be used in preference.
- 19 July 2006: Meteosat-7 (Meteosat First Generation) images will not be available or may not have grid overlays whilst the satellite is moved to its new location over the Indian Ocean.
- 16 June 2006: Our Meteosat-7 archive (going back to 2001) is now available
again, via the Geostationary images page.
We are working on restoring the other services, such as global composites.
- 14 June 2006: The PDUS service terminated on 14 June when the
Meteosat-7 satellite stopped transmissions. All users are recommended to
start using our MSG service instead.
- 17 March 2006: Advance warning of potential disruption to services on
12 and 13 April 2006 due to a complete network upgrade. There may be short
periods where our servers are unavailable but this will be kept to a minimum.
- 16 March 2006: New telephone numbers: please note that our telephone
numbers have changed (34-prefix has become 38-prefix) and our fax number
will be changing soon too (new number to be confirmed).
- 13 December 2005: A high-resolution image of the oil depot fire near
Hemel Hempstead is now available on our
interesting images page.
- 25 September 2005:
Campus-wide power loss again caused some passes to be missed. Hopefully
repairs made to the University's power system this time should prevent
such incidents in the future.
- 10 September 2005:
A major power failure on 9 September resulted in a total loss of power to the
whole university. Consequently our reception capability and website
availability was much reduced. Apologies for the missing data.
- 1 August 2005:
The movie is now encoded in MPEG-4; the DivX codec may be needed on Windows
in order to play it. Whilst the file size is larger, the quality is now much
better and the frame rate is more reasonable.
- 2005:
The antenna cameras have been upgraded and moved to a new location. The 2.8m
antenna camera now shows Dundee Law (hill) and if you look closely you will
see two antennas on the building in front. The 3.7m antenna camera also shows
our three Meteosat antennas (one large, one small tv-size, one obscured by
tree leaves in summer).
- 2005:
The Pass Database now records information about which AVHRR channel 3 is
being broadcast. This allows searches to be restricted to passes when the
visible channel was in use, for example.
- 2005:
All AVHRR passes in our archive can be ordered instantly; there is no need
to make arrangements for a particular pass to be placed in the online file sets
area.
- 1 April 2005:
In line with NOAA we are now providing AVHRR level-1b data in a slightly
modified format. Please check for upgrades in your image processing software
which reads this format. If this causes problems then please let us know.
- 9 February 2005:
The PDUS reception system developed a temporary fault
affecting all geostationary images. A temporary replacement
provided geostationary images from MSG
(Meteosat Second Generation) instead.
- 24 December 2004:
The NASA agreement with Orbimage to purchase SeaWiFS data has ended, causing
the loss of all research-use licences to real-time data. Dundee is still
receiving and archiving the encrypted data, with the hope of decryption keys
being made available when a new agreement is finally reached.
- 20 November 2004:
The Satellite Receiving Station is currently exhibiting a collection of
satellite images in the Lamb Gallery of the University of Dundee. The gallery,
on the first floor of the Tower Building, contains both black-and-white and
colour images showing many interesting land and weather features. On display
are real-time satellite images shown as they are being received from an antenna
on the Dental Building, and even a small antenna is simulating the tracking of
these satellites. Entrance is free and the exhibition runs until 14 January.
- 09 July 2004:
Our Meteosat Image Archive is now available from our web site, giving easy (if
not yet fast) access to nearly three years of full-resolution images. To access
it follow the link from the bottom of the "Archive" page for any of the
Meteosat sensors.
- 19 April 2004:
Apologies for the absent web site today; our RAID server developed a problem
with two hard disks simultaneously.
- 15 April 2004:
The Interesting Images page has been updated
with images of a "square" cloud and of the first recorded hurricane in the
South Atlantic.
- 24 March 2004:
There was a small break in service caused by our firewall exploding.
- 10 March 2004:
We have now installed a new antenna on the top of another university tower
building. At the moment it is a 1.8m reflector and will be used to receive
SeaWiFS and AVHRR, replacing the small antenna which was recently removed
from the dental tower building. The webcam page
does not show the new antenna, although it does still show the ghost of the
old one!
- 15 January 2004:
Terra Direct Broadcast has been restored.
- 14 January 2004:
NOAA-16 has more problems with the AVHRR scan motor.
- 01 December 2003:
Terra has developed a problem with it's direct broadcast transmission
causing the downlinked data to be corrupt. NASA are working on a solution
but until it is implemented we are receiving MODIS data from Aqua.
- 22 September 2003:
Recent passes from NOAA-16 show that it is suffering a similar fate to NOAA-15,
ie. problems with the AVHRR scan motor. Incidentally, it looks as though
the NOAA-N' launch may be delayed.
- 14 August 2003:
New SeaWiFS policy: the quicklooks are now available to all users. The only
necessity for registration with NASA is for viewing the most recent 14 days.
Similarly for ordering any high resolution data over 5 years old (more recent
high resolution data still requires NASA registration).
- 30 June 2003:
Geostationary images were unavailable over the weekend 28/29 due to DNS
problems. Current imagery is being served OK.
- 10 March 2003:
The PDUS (geostationary) images are now available only
to registered users, although they remain free. You can avoid entering your
password by setting a new cookie.
- 15 January 2003:
Pass database search results can now be browsed using the Next Result and
Previous Result links at the top of the quicklook images.
- 26 October 2002:
Sorry for the interruption to our service which was caused by an extended
power failure to the building (lasting longer than our UPS batteries).
- 16 October 2002:
Navigation correction of NOAA AVHRR
images on this site is now being carried out using software provided by
VCS Aktiengesellschaft.
- 30 September 2002:
The SeaWiFS satellite had an onboard computer reset September 26.
Although there was no interruption in imaging, the spacecraft clock was affected,
and all data taken since then have significant navigation errors (~40 km).
OrbImage plans to correct the clock error and assess the extent of the
problem. Hopefully some form of correction may be possible to recover the
navigation for this period.
- 27 June 2002:
New web cameras have been installed to monitor the
antennae live as they track satellites.
- 24 June 2002:
NOAA-17 was launched successfully.
- 27 May 2002:
The whole of our AVHRR archive is now
available as quicklooks from our web site, as the long process of copying
from tape to CD-ROM has finally been completed.
- 16 April 2002:
MODIS reception has been sporadic recently due to NASA Ground Network tests,
Terra SFE shutdown and antenna re-wiring.
- 29 March 2002:
MODIS has been returned to working Science Mode and the Nadir Aperture door
was opened at approximately 22:53 GMT on March 28. We have succesfully acquired
MODIS imagery today.
Firewall testing will take place again on Monday 1st April.
- 26 March 2002:
We are installing a Firewall on 28th March.
There may be minor interruptions during the day to WWW access while the firewall is tested.
- 21 March 2002:
Terra was placed into a safe hold mode following a routine orbital maneuver on 19th
March. There was no MODIS data transmission from Terra on 20th March.
- 4 February 2002:
We are now receiving and archiving night-time MODIS data, giving a total of
six to eight passes per day. Note that MODIS does not transmit any visible
channels during the night; for details see the MODIS
scanner document.
- 28 January 2002:
Some passes have not been received today and others have been truncated
to protect the antennas during the 160 km/hour winds.
- 11 October 2001:
Added a MODIS Frequently Asked Questions page to cover most of the recent MODIS developments.
- 21 August 2001:
Two exciting improvements to our free images:
- 25 July 2001:
Mount Enta, a volcano on the island of Sicily, erupted recently. The effects
are clearly visible from our satellite images.
- 3 July 2001:
MODIS is working again; three good passes were recorded today.
- 22 June 2001:
Added images of solar eclipse over Africa, 21 June 2001.
- 19 June 2001:
The lack of MODIS images on our web site is due to a problem with the
instrument. NASA are currently investigating it and hope to have the
problem resolved soon.
- 7 June 2001:
Our new antenna has been brought into service
for MODIS reception. As it is in a better situation than our old antenna we
will no longer experience the signal loss on easterly passes which caused
a dropout over Scandinavia.
Some web pages and software have been upgraded - let us know if you
experience any problems.
- 11 May 2001: Added more images to our
new antenna page.
- 7 May 2001:
We are now routinely receiving broadcasts from NOAA-16 as the sea surface
temperature algorithm parameters have been confirmed.
- 2 April 2001:
MODIS data reception from Terra has been restored after the failure of MODIS Receiver.
Current system is using a prototype MODIS receiver on loan from Crawford Space Communications.
So far all indications are that the receiver is functioning as intended.
- 30 March 2001:
Three AVHRR passes were lost early this morning due to a power failure in the
building. PDUS transmissions were also missed. Two MODIS passes were lost due
to a hardware failure caused by the power cut. The web server was unavailable
all morning whilst a new UPS was installed (it was delivered too late to assist
during the power cut!).
- 24th March:
Two SeaWiFS passes were lost because OrbView-2 experienced difficulties in transmitting image data.
- 6 March 2001:
MODIS data collected on 3 to 5 March 2001 has been archived but the imagery
has not been extracted due to changes to the MODIS instrument made by Mission
Operations in NASA. We hope to recover imagery and restore quicklooks in the
near future.
- 28 February 2001:
Meteosat midday images were not available from 21 to 27 February due to
interference caused by the spring eclipse season.
- 14 February 2001:
A complete power failure in the building this morning caused the loss of
two AVHRR passes and a number of PDUS images.
- 09 February 2001:
Added images of snow cover in Scotland to the Interesting Images page.
- 09 January 2001:
Added images of flooding in England to the Interesting Images page.
- 20 November 2000:
A problem with the XSU (Cross Strap Unit) on NOAA-14 caused corruption in data
received from 16 November 15:12 to 19 November 04:43.
- 22 October 2000:
A new 2.8m antenna has been installed for better
reception from EOS and future satellites.
- 21 September 2000:
NOAA-L (16) was successfully launched at 10:22 UTC. We will not be archiving
data from it until it is officially declared operational in a few weeks time.
- 18 August 2000:
MODIS transmissions have restarted after a hardware fault was corrected with a software patch.
NOAA-15 is still being tested.
For details see the NESDIS page.
- 8 August 2000:
MODIS has been suspended whilst problems with its formatter are investigated.
NOAA-15 AVHRR is no longer producing usable imagery.
- 10 July 2000:
The AVHRR scan motor on NOAA-15 appears to have failed.
- 3 July 2000:
MODIS quicklooks are available in our
quicklook archive. Scenes are not yet available for ordering from our web
site but can be supplied by arrangement.
- 29 May 2000:
Meteosat and other geostationary satellite images were unavailable over the
weekend due to the theft of some Sun computers from the University.
- 11 May 2000:
The first MODIS image from Terra showing the UK
is now available!
- 4 May 2000:
We apologise for the lack of real-time SeaWiFS data over the past week, due to
a failure of the Orbital SGP decryption box. However, no passes have been lost.
- 2 May 2000:
First Terra direct broadcast images received and decoded successfully.
Note that direct broadcast is switched off over Madrid due to NASA's Deep Space
Network antenna there. This causes early termination of passes overhead of
Dundee, as can be seen from the pass area on the predictions page.
- 3 March 2000:
- The Interesting Images page has been updated
with an image showing a volcano erupting on Iceland.
- Midday images from Meteosat were not available for the last ten days due to
interference caused by the eclipse season; sorry for any inconvenience.
- 24 February 2000:
One AVHRR and one SeaWiFS pass were lost today due to a campus-wide total power failure.
- 20 December 1999:
The Terra satellite was launched at 1900 GMT on 18 December 1999. Data from its
MODIS sensor will be broadcast on X-band and received
here in Dundee. We hope reception will start early in 2000 after the satellite
has been tested and declared operational.
- 8 December 1999:
Geostationary satellite images from GMS, GOES-East and GOES-West were not
updated from 00:00 4 December 1999 to 18:00 on 6 December 1999 due to a failure
in the uplink at CMS Lannion.
- 1 December 1999:
Several passes were lost on 29 November due to a campus-wide total power failure.
SeaWiFS data was not transmitted on 16-18 November as a precaution against the
meteor shower. We are still receiving NOAA-12 in preference to NOAA-15 since there
are continuing problems after its switch to a replacement transmitter.
- 27 August 1999:
The Interesting Images page has been updated
with an image of circular contrails from an AWACS aircraft, and an image from the
GOES-West satellite showing the moon in the background.
- 26 August 1999:
The Interesting Images page has been updated
with images of the solar eclipse and of the oil refinery fire in Turkey.
- 19 May 1999:
Due to problems with data dropouts from NOAA-15 we have now reverted to NOAA-12.
The problems are suspected to be caused by cracks in the connections to the
satellite's antenna which have developed from thermal stresses as it emerges
from shadow into sunlight. We will be monitoring NOAA-15 periodically to see
if the situation improves. Let us know if you require any of NOAA-15's features
such as channel 3A or the dual-slope visible channels.
- 29 April 1999:
Pseudo-colour quicklook images are now available. They are not intended to
represent true colour; rather to help distinguish between land, sea and cloud.
For more details please see our free images page.
- 20 April 1999:
High resolution data customers can supplement their image data orders with files containing the zenith and azimuth angles for both the satellite and the sun. Each of the four files will contain an angle for all pixels in the image.
- 9 April 1999:
Recently we have been experiencing corrupted data from NOAA satellites, visible
on quicklooks and in high resolution data. One reason was found to be interference from nearby newly-installed mobile telephone transmitters, although this has now been corrected. However NOAA have announced a problem with NOAA-15 that can result in corrupted data; please see their "NOAA-15 HPRT Transmission Dropouts" bulletin for more information.
- 1 April 1999:
High resolution data customers can store their order settings as their
default profile, see the documentation
for more details.
- 2 November 1998:
NOAA-15 passes are being routinely received and archived
now that the satellite has been declared operational by NOAA. Note that it will
be transmitting channel 3B continuously until February 1999; ie. there will be
no alternating between channels 3A and 3B until then. Important note for
users of HRPT data: if you request data in NOAA Level-1b format it will be
in the new KLM style for NOAA-15 because the old format cannot represent the
new calibration correctly. You should ensure your software can handle the new
format before ordering. If you do not use the calibration, and wish to retain
the old format then please contact the webmaster.
- 22 October 1998:
Images of the Indian Ocean from IODC(INDOEX) are now available on the Geostationary Images page.
- 14 September 1998:
A colour movie is now updated every six hours from the latest Meteosat images.
- 19 May 1998:
The SeaWiFS quicklook archive is now on-line and available to all those who have registered with NASA as an authorised research user.
- 15 May 1998:
New satellite NOAA-15 has been launched. The first
images are in visible channels only while tests are performed. The satellite
will become operational and replace NOAA-12 in a few weeks.
- 15 April 1998:
Meteosat animation added to the movie
page.
- 1 March 1998:
The latest FULL RESOLUTION!
Geostationary satellite images received at Dundee from METEOSAT's
HRI digital downlink have been added. Also included are GMS, GOES-E, GOES-W
imagery. This is a developing service and may change in the future.
- 12 February 1998:
Our web server is now running on a new machine
which is much more powerful and has a faster network connection. Although the
numerical address has changed, the name
http://www.sat.dundee.ac.uk/ remains
the same. Our ftp server has also moved and no longer carries our quicklook
archive.
Quicklooks for 1982 have been added to the web archive.
- 1 February 1998: Quicklook archive
greatly expanded with the addition of images for 1978 to 1981, as well as 1993
to the present.
- 9 January 1998: Re-written documentation.
- 18 November 1997: SeaWiFS data is now available in more image
formats and can be calibrated to sensor radiances.
The on-line files
listing can be sorted in various ways.
The quicklook archive browser no
longer lists GIF images, only JPEG. GIFs are still available (replace
.jpg with .gif in the URL) but most people should be using JPEG now as the files
are smaller and faster to download. If you require GIF images please contact the
webmaster.
- 5 September 1997: There is no longer any need for you to remember your
username and password if your browser accepts cookies. Simply
set the cookie once and it will persist until you
next change your password. Authentication will be performed automatically so you
will not be asked for your username and password.
- 1 August 1997: SeaWiFS launched successfully.
Data will start flowing in the third week of September.
- 3 February 1997: Monthly quicklooks are now available
on CD-ROM.
- 26 November 1996: The whole quicklook archive for 1994 is now available.
- 25 November 1996: The Satellite Station's fibre optic network connection
has been rerouted which we hope will increase data transfer rates.
- 6 November 1996: The introduction of replacement discs means that
restoration of the quicklook archive can start. All images from 1995 and 1996
are now available.
- 5 November 1996: The high resolution service has been upgraded. The
introduction of new software has meant some changes to the user interface and to
the functionality. All HRPT customers should read the
documentation to familiarise themselves with
the changes.
An extra disc has increased the number of HRPT passes we can
keep online.
- 25 October 1996: All quicklooks for 1996 have been restored.
- 17 October 1996: Maintenance undertaken this morning should make the system
better able to cope with heavy loads.
- 23 September 1996: An extra satellite image, the NOAA-12 evening overhead
pass, will be received at about 18:00 GMT each day.
- 05 August 1996: A disc crash has temporarily reduced the amount of
QuickLooks we can make available from our archive. We hope to back to normal in
a few weeks.
- 12 June 1996: The Pass Database now gives links to images showing the pass
area. Complex searches can now include equator crossing angle ranges.
- 21 May 1996:
- 26 April 1996: Installation of registration system for all users.
- 05 April 1996: HRPT orders can now request a calibration file too.
- 30 March 1996: Updated the MPEG movie.
- 26 March 1996: Registered users can now set their preferred QuickLook size
from the personal preferences page.
- 22 February 1996: Coordinates chosen in the Pass
Database can now be combined using either AND or OR.
- 09 January 1996:
- New feature: There are now URLs for downloading the latest images
without having to browse the archive. Please read the guide
for details.
- Quicklook and HRPT directory documents (browse
and filesorder respectively) should now expire
from your cache after one hour to ensure that you have the latest copy.
- Archive HRPT passes which have been reloaded can now be browsed and their
quicklooks viewed.
- With the addition of another 9GB disc we have increased the size of our
quicklook archive to include most of 1993 onwards.
- The number of recent HRPT files on-line has been increased to 36; over
three days worth of passes.
- Links into the archive for the most recent day/month/year are now fixed.
- The ordering system has been reimplemented for registered HRPT users.
- 22 November 1995: GIF quicklooks are now interlaced so you should see the
full image quickly at a coarse resolution which will improve as more data is
transferred. If interlaced GIFs cause problems please notify the webmaster.
- 06 October 1995: We have increased our disc space for live passes and so
are now receiving 8 per day. We hope to increase this to 12 soon.
- 02 October 1995: Added a Frequently Asked Questions
file.
- 29 September 1995: The projection of the area around the UK is now
histogram equalised so it should look better.
- 30 June 1995: New reception software is in operation. The visible
difference is much more detailed grids on the quicklooks.
- 19 June 1995: Quicklooks can now be transferred in JPEG format as well as
GIF so they should transfer three times quicker. Because JPEG is `lossy' there
may be a tiny loss of quality although it should not be noticable.
- 26 May 1995: Added interesting images page.
- 11 May 1995: Links into various parts of the archive have been added to the
home page. The program /abin/browseroot now takes you to root of the
archive, rather than the latest pass. People with links straight to that program
please take note!
- 15 February 1995: NOAA-14 Calibration Data
added.
- 19 January 1995: Documentation on Satellite
Projections added.
- 19 January 1995: NOAA-14 is now fully operational. Passes will be received
and archived from 19th/20th January.
- 18 January 1995: The area covered by a predicted
pass can now be viewed.
- 16 January 1995: A standard map projection for a fixed area is now
available for recent passes.
- 09 January 1995: NCSA Server upgraded with bug fix to prevent truncated
images. The bug only affected certain users (eg. Solaris or PC) but caused
corrupt thumbnails and quicklooks.
- 06 January 1995: NOAA-14 has been launched. It is still in testing but the
software has been upgraded in preparation.
- 06 January 1995: High-resolution order form
preceded by new document showing current HRPT files
graphically.
- 10 November 1994: New pass database interface.
This should replace both the old pass database and the thumbnails browser.
- 14 September 1994: NOAA-11 AVHRR scanner failed.
NOAA-09 will be received instead.
- 09 September 1994: Pass database created.
- 09 September 1994: What's New page created.
- 08 September 1994: Thumbnails pass
categories altered, especially Overhead which now has some overlap with Westerly
and Easterly passes.
- January 1994: The launch of (probably) the world's first satellite
receiving station web site.
