News - How to guides

HEDAVI Discover: a step-by-step guide

The Heritage Data Visualisation tool (HEDAVI) is a platform developed by the French Science Consulting for Earth Observation group, VisioTerra, which allows users to freely access over 40 years of ESA Earth Observation Heritage data, Third Party Missions and some Copernicus data.

News - Operational News

Change of access to FTP-S for ERS and Envisat atmospheric and low-rate data

As of 13 December 2023, access to a series of ERS and Envisat atmospheric and low rate data collections changed from simple FTP to FTP-S.

News - Thematic area articles

Cloud-free collections key for land monitoring

Satellite imagery is a crucially important tool for monitoring the land, but cloud cover can often block parts of Earth’s surface from view, limiting subsequent analyses.

News - Success Stories

Commercial and international data for fire monitoring

As climate change sparks a surge in the frequency and intensity of wildfires, satellite data disseminated through ESA’s Third Party Missions (TPM) programme are helping scientists to track and investigate these potentially damaging natural events.

Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

Landsat 5 TM European and Mediterranean Countries Cloud Free Collection

This dataset contains the cloud-free products from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper collection acquired over Europe, North Africa and the Middle East; for each scene only one product is selected, with the minimal cloud coverage. The acquired Landsat TM scene covers approximately 183 x 172.8 km. A standard full scene is nominally centred on the intersection between a path and row (the actual image centre can vary by up to 100 m). The data are system corrected.

Tools - Catalogues

FedEO

FedEO is a data catalogue that provides a unique entry point to a number of scientific catalogues and services for, but not limited to, European and Canadian missions.

Tools - Catalogues

ESA PDGS DataCube

ESA's DataCube is a data catalogue that enables multi-temporal and pixel-based access to a subset of data available from ESA

Tools - Catalogues

EO CAT

EO CAT is a data catalogue, offering a Next Generation Earth Observation system designed to manage end-user Earth Observation services.

News - Data Release news

Full European Landsat data collection now available under the same catalogue

The Full European Landsat data collection, from Landsat-1 to Landsat-8, is now available under the same catalogue

News - Events and Proceedings

National missions in the spotlight at the Living Planet Symposium

In the framework of ESA’s Third Party Missions (TPM) programme, the agency offers access to the full data archives of almost 50 satellite missions, which are owned by organisations around the world.

News - Spotlight on EO community

Introducing Mirko Albani

In this short introduction, ESA's Heritage Missions Programme Manager describes what he likes most about ESA's long term archive of satellite mission data and his role in the programme.

Activity - Projects

Dragon 2 Cooperation Programme

The Dragon 2 Programme focussed on the exploitation of ESA, ESA's Third Party Missions and Chinese Earth observation data for science and applications development in land, ocean and atmospheric applications.

Data - Data Description

Landsat TM ESA archive

This dataset contains all the Landsat-5 Thematic Mapper high-quality ortho-rectified L1T dataset acquired by ESA over the Fucino, Matera, Kiruna and Maspalomas visibility masks, as well as campaign data over Malindi, Bishkek, Chetumal, and Libreville. The acquired Landsat TM scene covers approximately 183 x 172.8 km. A standard full scene is nominally centred on the intersection between a path and row (the actual image centre can vary by up to 100 m). A full image is composed of 6920 pixels x 5760 lines and each band requires 40 MB of storage space (uncompressed) at 30 m spatial resolution in the VIS, NIR and SWIR as well as 120 m in the TIR spectral range. Kiruna Landsat TM GTC density map Maspalomas Landsat TM GTC density map Matera Landsat TM GTC density map

Tools - Apps

Heritage Missions app for Android

Download the Heritage Missions application to discover what the missions were about, how it worked and what the elements of the space and ground segment that make these missions unique.

News - Data Release news

New reprocessed Landsat data on a new dissemination server

The full ESA Landsat archive has been reprocessed with the latest version of the processor to provide a homogenous dataset covering MSS, TM and ETM+ data.

Document - Product Specifications

Landsat-TM-ETM-CEOS-ESA-Products

This document describes the standards used by ESA for the distribution of the TM and ETM+ (Thematic Mapper and Enhanced Thematic Mapper) optical sensor products.

Document - Technical Note

Landsat 7 ETM Image Assessment System Radiometric Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document

Document - Technical Note

Landsat 7 ETM Image Assessment System Geometric Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document

Tools - Visualisation

EVDC Orbit Prediction Tool

The EVDC Orbit Prediction and Overpass Tool generates and visualises satellite's overpasses.

Data - Fast Registration with immediate access (Open)

ERS PRARE Precise Orbit Product (ERS.ORB.POD/ERS.ORB/PRC)

The precise orbit results from a data reduction process in which all available tracking data (Single-Lens Reflex, radar altimeter crossovers, PRARE range and Doppler data) and most accurate correction, transformation and dynamical models are taken into account and in which high level numerical procedures are applied. These orbits are "optimal" achievable representations of the real orbital motion under the circumstances of tracking situation and the "state of the art" model situation. The precise orbit product for the ERS satellites are the satellite ephemeris (position and velocity vector) including time tag, given in a well-defined reference frame, together with the nominal satellite attitude information and a radial orbit correction. Several orbit solutions are currently distributed: A new set of ORB POD (Precise Orbit Determination - REAPER v2) computed with the most updated model standards for the complete ERS-1 and ERS-2 mission. A previous set of ORB POD (REAPER v1) data already available on the ESA dissemination site since 2014, covering the ERS-1 full mission and the ERS-2 mission up to July 2003. ORB PRC which is the original Precise Orbit dataset computed during the ERS mission operations for ERS-1 and ERS-2. In the new POD dataset (REAPER v2) for the ERS-1 and ERS-2 missions, two different orbit solutions are provided together with the combined solution to be used for processing of the radar altimeter measurements and the determination of geodetic/geophysical products: those computed by DEOS (Delft Institute of Earth Observation and Space Systems), and those generated by ESOC (European Space Operations Centre) using different software (GEODYN and NAPEOS respectively). Careful evaluation of the various solutions of REAPER v2 has shown that the DEOS solution for both ERS-1 and ERS-2 has the best performance and is recommended to be used as reference. See the ERS Orbit Validation Report. For the previous version of the POD data set (REAPER v1), with ERS-2 mission data only up to 2003, three different orbit solutions together with the combined solution are available. These precise orbits for ERS-1 and ERS-2 have been computed at DEOS, ESOC, and GFZ (Deutschen GeoForschungsZentrums) using different software and different altimeter databases. Combined solutions have been created using three individual solutions for each satellite. All orbits were derived using consistent models in the same LPOD2005 terrestrial reference frame. These new orbit solutions show notable improvement with respect to DGME04 orbits (Scharroo and Visser, 1998). Thus, RMS crossover differences of new orbits improved by 4-9 mm. Careful evaluation of the various solutions has shown that the combined solution for both ERS-1 and ERS-2 has the best performance. All POD orbit files (REAPER v1/v2) are available in SP3c format.