NERC Airborne Research and Survey Facility (ARSF) Remote Sensing Data

The Airborne Research & Survey Facility (ARSF, formerly Airborne Remote Sensing Facility) is managed by NERC Scientific Services and Programme Management. It provides the UK environmental science community, and other potential users, with the means to obtain remotely-sensed data in the form of synoptic analogue and digital imagery for use in research, survey and monitoring programmes. Data offered by the facility includes:

1) Aerial photography data collected with an analogue camera, the Wild RC-10 visible NIR, in conjunction with CASI and ATM instruments.

2) Airborne Thematic Mapper (ATM): ARSF has flown two ATM instruments over the period 1982 - 2008: the Daedalus 1268 was operated from 1982 until 1998. Since 1996 and until 2008 an upgraded version - the Azimuth Systems AZ-16 was used, along with an improved data acquisition system.

3) LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) data from an Optech ALTM 3033 instrument. The sensor is on loan to the ARSF only for some periods of the year from the Unit of Landscape Modelling (ULM) at Cambridge University.

4) High spectral and spatial resolution data from the Compact Airborne Spectrographic Imager (CASI 2). The CASI 2, produced by Itres Research of Canada, is a two-dimensional CCD array-based pushbroom imaging spectrograph operated by ARSF until 2007

5) High spectral and spatial resolution data from the AISA Eagle and Hawk hyperspectral sensors (since 2007). The AISA Eagle is a 12 bit, pushbroom, hyperspectral sensor with a 1000 pixel swath width, covering the visible and near infra-red spectrum 400 - 970nm. The AISA Hawk is a 14 bit sensor able to capture short wave infrared wavelengths, 970 - 2450nm.

The ARSF currently uses a Dornier 228 aircraft. This extensively modified aircraft is not only capable of accommodating the current ARSF core instrumentation, as well as additional experimental optical and geophysical sensors, but is also configured to deploy a range of atmospheric instrumentation and samplers. Such a comprehensive data service cannot be easily achieved by other survey techniques. The operational flying season generally spans from early March until early October. Three elements determine this period: weather, solar zenith angle and vegetation state; maintenance on the aircraft; sensor maintenance as this is performed by the manufacturers between November and January. Every day during this season, the ARSF has to make difficult decisions on whether or not to attempt flying based on weather forecasts, and to prioritise the most important projects based on many parameters. Flying schedule is available from the ARSF website.

The NEODC holds the entire archive of Airborne Thematic Mapper (ATM) and Compact Airborne Spectrographic Imager (CASI) data acquired by the NERC ARSF. High-resolution scanned digital versions of the entire collection of analogue photographs are now also available as well as selected LiDAR-derived elevation and terrain models for selected sites flown using the sensor.

Date (Publication): 2007-12-10T03:01:43

Date (Creation): 2007-12-10T03:01:43

Citation identifier: https://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/55d1c9b6e7a4ce41b7a6f8416b7b6261

Citation identifier: NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC) / 55d1c9b6e7a4ce41b7a6f8416b7b6261

Point of contact

Organisation name	Electronic mail address	Role
NERC Airborne Research and Survey Facility (ARSF)	unknown	Author
Airborne Research and Survey Facility (ARSF)	unknown	Author
NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC)	neodc@rl.ac.uk	Custodian
NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC)	neodc@rl.ac.uk	Distributor
NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC)	neodc@rl.ac.uk	pointofContact
NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC)	neodc@rl.ac.uk	Publisher

Maintenance and update frequency: Unknown

Update scope: Series

Keywords

NERC
ARSF
CASI
ATM
LiDAR
EAGLE
HAWK

GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0

atmospheric conditions

Access constraints: Other restrictions

Other constraints: All data within this dataset collection are available to any registered CEDA user.

Use constraints: Other restrictions

Other constraints: Under the following licence http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/, appropriate use of these data may fall under any use. This message is intended as guidance, always read the full licence. When using these data you must cite them correctly using the citation given on the CEDA Data Catalogue record.

Spatial representation type: Grid

Language: English

Topic category

Climatology, meteorology, atmosphere

Begin date: 1982-09-09T23:00:00

End date: 2012-09-06T12:22:07

Unique resource identifier: WGS 84

Distribution format

Name	Version
Contact data centre for format details.

Distributor contact

Organisation name	Individual name	Electronic mail address	Role
NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC)		neodc@rl.ac.uk	Distributor

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/55d1c9b6e7a4ce41b7a6f8416b7b6261	CEDA Data Catalogue Page

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://arsf.nerc.ac.uk/	NERC ARSF website

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://arsf-dan.nerc.ac.uk/trac/wiki/Downloads	AZGCORR Software

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://zenodo.org/record/7356530	Airborne Remote Sensing Facility User Guide Handbook

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://www.geog.cam.ac.uk/cucap/	Unit for Landscape Modelling (ULM), University of Cambridge website

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://arsf.nerc.ac.uk/data/azimuth.asp	ARSF Data Processing

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://www.teledyneoptech.com/	LIDAR manufacturer website

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://www.ncaveo.ac.uk/geometric_correction/	NCAVEO website

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://artefacts.ceda.ac.uk/neodc_docs/Camera_Certs/	Camera Calibration Certificates

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://zenodo.org/record/7356412	NERC ARSF Photography Data Base document

Hierarchy level: Series

Conformance result

Title: Commission Regulation (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services

Date (Publication): 2010-12-08

Statement: Please see data lineage statements for each dataset within this collection for data lineage details.

Metadata

File identifier: 55d1c9b6e7a4ce41b7a6f8416b7b6261 XML

Metadata language: English

Character set: UTF8

Hierarchy level: Series

Hierarchy level name: series

Date stamp: 2025-06-06T02:26:55

Metadata standard name: UK GEMINI

Metadata standard version: 2.3

Metadata author

Organisation name	Individual name	Electronic mail address	Role
NERC Earth Observation Data Centre (NEODC)		neodc@rl.ac.uk	Point of contact

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