Landsat 1: "Earth Resources Technology Satellite" (ERTS) 1973 NASA

more at http://quickfound.net/

'This film illustrates how the Earth Resources Technology Satellite (ERTS) helped to meet the need for a worldwide survey of Earth resources in order to assist scientists and governments plan their use and conservation.'

NASA Film HQ-223, produced by Audio Productions.

Originally a public domain film from NASA, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landsat_program

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

The Landsat program is the longest-running enterprise for acquisition of satellite imagery of Earth. On July 23, 1972 the Earth Resources Technology Satellite was launched. This was eventually renamed to Landsat. The most recent, Landsat 8, was launched on February 11, 2013. The instruments on the Landsat satellites have acquired millions of images. The images, archived in the United States and at Landsat receiving stations around the world, are a unique resource for global change research and applications in agriculture, cartography, geology, forestry, regional planning, surveillance and education, and can be viewed through the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) 'EarthExplorer' website. Landsat 7 data has eight spectral bands with spatial resolutions ranging from 15 to 60 meters; the temporal resolution is 16 days. Landsat images are usually divided into scenes for easy downloading. Each Landsat scene is about 115 miles long and 115 miles wide (or 100 nautical miles long and 100 nautical miles wide, or 185 kilometers long and 185 kilometers wide)...

One of the great advantages of remote sensing is that it provides data at a broader and more global level that is otherwise impossible to gather when using conventional equipment. However, there is a tradeoff between the local detail of the measurements and the scale of the area being measured compared to using other remote sensing methods such as aerial imagery.

Remote sensing provides information about geographic spaces, like ecosystems that allows scientists to predict the distribution of species, as well as detecting both natural occurring and anthropogenic generated changes in a greater scale than traditional data provided by field work. It also presents data more accurately than models that are derived from field work. The different bands in Landsat, with diverse spectral range provide highly differentiated applications. There are big and diverse applications of Landsat imagery and satellite date in general, ranging from ecology to geopolitical matters. Land cover determination has become a very common use of Landsat Imagery and remotely sensing generated images all around the world...

Landsat 8, launched 11 February 2013, is the most recent satellite in the Landsat series. It was launched on an Atlas V 401 from Vandenberg Air Force Base by the Launch Services Program. It will continue to obtain valuable data and imagery to be used in agriculture, education, business, science, and government. The new satellite was assembled in Arizona by Orbital Sciences Corporation.

Preliminary planning has begun for Landsat 9, though its future remains uncertain. Over the course of FY2014 financial planning "appropriators chided NASA for unrealistic expectations that a Landsat 9 would cost $1 billion, and capped spending at $650 million" according to a report by the Congressional Research Service. Senate appropriators have advised NASA to plan for a launch no later than 2020. In April 2015, NASA and the USGS announced that work on Landsat 9 had commenced, with funding allocated for the satellite in the president's FY2016 budget, for a planned launch in 2023. Funding for the development of a low-cost thermal infrared (TIR) free-flying satellite for launch in 2019 was also proposed, to ensure data continuity by flying in formation with Landsat 8...