Landsat 8 Launch

       Here is advancement in the GIS world. With the Landsat Mission that has been available for about four decades, Scientists and researchers in the GIS field have benefited from the services available on the Landsat system. This has helped us understand our home “Earth” better by monitoring the changes both in natural and human activities. This has been possible by assisting the people to view the world beyond what the human sight can perceive. The Landsat 8 is much advanced than its predecessors having high precision and modern sensors. Using the Landsat 7 and Landsat 8, more scientific tasks will be achieved as the two can now provide the required data wherever needed. The Landsat mission will document various phenomena such as volcanic eruptions and forest fires.

        NASA has officially handed over the Landsat 8 project to the US Geological Survey (USGS).This is after a series of checks and experiments to ensure its working since its launch on February 11, 2013 from the California’s Vandenberg Air force Base. The USGS has the full operational control of the Landsat 8.The Landsat 7 was launched on April 15, 1999 and was in good condition of operation until May 31, 2003 when it developed a problem with the Scan Line Corrector (SLC).The failure of the SLC led to loss of data at the edges of the images taken from the Landsat 7.This loss is equivalent to 22KM at the edges of the images. With the launch of the Landsat 8, the problem of data loss is now solved. This means the images taken using the Landsat 8 will not have the missing data on the edges.The data from the Landsat 8 is now available for download on the internet. For more information on Landsat 8 visit here