Features

Image from TERRA
Terra Observes Shark Bay, Australia
Tue, 01 Aug 2023 11:50 EDT

Hamelin Pool Marine Nature Reserve, seen here in an image from the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on the Terra spacecraft on Dec. 30, 2010, is a special site.

Image from TERRA
Katmai National Park
Tue, 18 Apr 2023 16:24 EDT

The Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes, located in Katmai National Park, forms a unique and ashen landscape. Encircled by volcanoes – both active and inactive – it has served as a perfect collection area for huge amounts of volcanic ash.

Image from TERRA
Eyes on the Snow as Water Supplies Dwindle
Tue, 20 Sep 2022 10:30 EDT

Water departments in the West are using maps and models originally created by a NASA team to help track water.

Home › Terra: The EOS Flagship

Terra: The EOS Flagship

Page Title

The Terra satellite team would like to inform the user community of an upcoming change in the flight operations of the mission expected to take place in mid-June 2023.

A recent programmatic change in the Terra mission is prompting the flight operation staffing to go from 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, with limited operational response when staff are not on site. For more information, see the graphic below.

Terra explores the connections between Earth’s atmosphere, land, snow and ice, ocean, and energy balance to understand Earth’s climate and climate change and to map the impact of human activity and natural disasters on communities and ecosystems

Images of five globes, each depicting an example of data collected by Terra instruments, including land composition from ASTER, reflected energy from CERES, vegetation snow and ice from MODIS, aerosols from MISR, and carbon monoxide from MOPITT.

 

Important Terra Updates and Information

Terra data users have expressed the need for weekly updates on Terra’s equator crossing time (in UTC Mean Local Time), as well as orbital altitude. Starting this month, we’ll be adding this information to the Terra homepage and updating it weekly using data provided by the Operations Team. Move your cursor over the chart below to view both Terra’s Mean Local Equator Crossing Time in UTC and orbital altitude for each month through 2026.

2023 Terra Updates

Click the links below to catch up on all the latest Terra news and updates!

  • NASA Celebrates Earth Day!
    April 20th is officially “Earth Day,” and NASA is celebrating with a hybrid event! Join us in-person (if you’re close to Union Station in Washington D.C.) or online! See the official NASA Earth Day website (linked here) or scan the QR code on the graphic below for more information and (free!) registration! (And if you’ll … Read more
  • Spring Updates from the Terra Team
    Spring is here — and so are the Terra science team meetings and workshops! Here’s a list of upcoming Team Meetings and Workshops related to the Terra mission, with additional information about each in the post below this list. 2023 MODIS/VIIRS Science Team Meeting The MODIS/VIIRS Science Team Meeting will be held May 1- 4, … Read more
  • Terra Celebrates Black History Month: Q&A with Alicia Scott, Former Terra Flight Operator

Past News Features

Terra’s Lower Orbit Virtual Community Forum

NASA’s Terra, Aqua, and Aura Drifting Orbits Workshop Information

Animated Overview of the Request for Information

Terra Begins Drifting. What’s Next?

After more than 20 years orbiting at 705 km above Earth’s surface and routinely crossing the equator at approximately the same time every day, Terra is now drifting. With no maneuvers planned to sustain Terra’s altitude and crossing time, Terra will slowly get closer and closer to Earth – crossing the equator earlier and earlier as time passes. However, despite impacts to some of Terra’s nearly 100 data products, Terra’s five sensors continue to collect meaningful scientific data, producing one of the longest continuous climate data records collected by a satellite. Read more…

Terra: Providing Critical Data to Help Society

 

Terra’s five sensors help us understand out changing planet and provide critical data used in applications from food security, volcanic monitoring, wildfire safety, public health, and climate modeling. Terra’s twenty years of data continue to contribute to how we understand Earth and how we respond when disasters strike.

Twenty Years of Terra in Our Lives

 

Terra’s suite of instruments allows us to understand our world well beyond what we knew twenty years ago, when Terra launched. In those twenty years, new applications and contributions to science have been made possible.

There is no question that technology has changed. But, at the same time that our lives on Earth were being shaped by our access to technology, 705 kilometers above us, a satellite was changing how we understood our planet.

For 20 years, Terra, the flagship Earth observing satellite,
has chronicled changes on Earth. Designed and built in the 1980s and 90s, NASA and Lockheed Martin engineers set out to build a satellite that could take simultaneous measurements of Earth’s atmosphere, land, and water. Its mission – to understand how Earth is changing and to identify the consequences for life on Earth. Season after season, Terra data continues to help
us understand how the evolving systems of our planet affect our lives – and how
we can use that data to benefit society. Read more and find resources from our anniversary events, Terra 20 Events

Update on Terra’s New Orbit: Since 2020, Terra has been drifting to an earlier equator crossing time, and in October 2022 was lowered by ~5km in altitude. These changes in orbit did not reduce the data quality of Terra products, and only created minor changes to orbital repeat time and swath width (for some instruments). See Terra’s New Orbit for more information.