The 2017 Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment Airborne Campaign (AAC) was one of the largest, most complex airborne science experiments conducted by NASA's Earth Science Division. Between April and November, the AAC involved ten aircraft in more than 200 science flights that conducted surveys across over 4 million km2 in Alaska and northwestern Canada. Many flights were coordinated with same-day ground-based measurements to link process-level studies with geospatial data products derived from satellite sensors. The AAC collected data spanning the critical intermediate space and time scales that are essential for a comprehensive understanding of scaling across the ABoVE Study Domain and ultimately extrapolation to the pan-Arctic using satellite data and ecosystem models. The AAC provided unique opportunities to validate satellite and airborne remote sensing data and data products for northern high latitude ecosystems. The science strategy coupled domain-wide sampling with so-called “Foundational Instrument", L-band and P-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR), imaging spectroscopy, full waveform LIDAR, atmospheric trace gases (including carbon dioxide and methane), as well as PI-led studies using Ka-band SAR and solar induced chlorophyll fluorescence. Targets of interest included field sites operated by the ABoVE Science Team as well as the intensive and/or long-term sites operated by US and Canadian partners.

• An overview of ABoVE airborne campaign data acquisitions and science opportunities

NASA conducted flights using AVIRIS-NG, L-band SAR (UAVSAR), and G-LiHT in 2018. Coordinated flights and ground validation were conducted with the German Aerospace Center (DLR). Targets of interest included field sites occupied by the ABoVE Science Team as well as the intensive sites operated by the DOE NGEE-Arctic on the Seward Peninsula and in Barrow, NSF's LTER sites at Toolik Lake (Arctic/North Slope) and Bonanza Creek (Boreal/Interior Alaska), the Canadian Cold Regions Hydrology sites in the Arctic tundra near Trail Valley Creek NT, the interdisciplinary science station at Scotty Creek NT, the Government of the Northwest Territories Slave River/Slave Delta watershed time series, the Kluane Lake (YT) Research Station, and numerous forest and fire disturbance US and Canadian Forest Services. NASA Stories organized with help from the NASA Office of Communications are posted here and Media Coverage articles are available here.

NASA conducted AVIRIS-NG flights during July 21 through 18 August, 2018. Primary mission was to obtain imagery over areas that were not imaged in 2017 due to weather conditions. Some flights were flown in "methane mode" over regions known or suspected to have high methane emissions.

2018 ABoVE AVIRIS-NG final coverage:

NASA conducted L-Band SAR (UAVSAR) flights during 18-31 August of 2018, repeating lines flown during the 2017 campaign to establish a multi-year time series. Sites included the BERMS site in Saskatchewan, the Peace-Athabascan Delta, road-accessible sites near Yellowknife and Inuvik, and a subset of sites in Alaska and Yukon that were of greatest interest to the SAR Working Group. New flight lines were planned and executed in coordination with the German Aerospace Center (see below). The BERMS sites was flown in TomoSAR mode.

• L-band Calendar with flight plans
• Flight lines, site names, and priorities (xlsx) (as of 16 August)
• L-band Flight lines (KMZ)

The DLR flew their F-SAR instrument over regions of the ABoVE Domain in the Northwest Territories and Saskatchewan in August 2018. DLR and ABoVE will share airborne and ground validation data from the coordinated collections at the Boreal Ecosystem Research and Monitoring Sites (BERMS) in Saskatchewan and at the Baker Creek watershed near Yellowknife, NT.

• DLR Flight lines (KMZ)

G-LiHT conducted flights for ABoVE during 13-15 July. The aircraft transited to the Tanana Valley to collect data over 1) forests that burned since the 2014 G-LiHT acquisitions; 2) Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory (CRREL) permafrost transects flown by G-LiHT in 2014; and 3) ABoVE 2018 requests over a) Creamer's Field near Fairbanks and b) Yukon Flats near Ft. Yukon. Weather did not permit collections over Delta Junction sites in 2018, but these may be attempted in 2019.

• Flightlines and Download Data
• G-LiHT Flight lines (KMZ)

During the active flight season, the NEON project flies two Airborne Observation Platforms (AOP) to collect data across NEON field sites. See the NEON Airborne Remote Sensing webpage.

Download Flightlines [XLSX] Download Flightlines [KML]

In the KMZ: GREEN = science quality data; YELLOW = partial cloud/smoke/other imperfections (parts of the line may be good); MAGENTA = unusable/unacquired lines.

Statistics for the AVIRIS 2019 ABoVE Airborne Campaign

• Campaign Duration: 36 Days (30 June – 4 August)
• Number of Science Flight Days: 27
• Number of Sorties: 37
• Number of flight hours: 129
• # lines acquired: 193 (this number will increase given some lines were flown multiple times)
• Est km of flight lines: 15,712 km (see column U, this number will increase given some lines were flown multiple times)
• Est number of sq km mapped: 51,850 km2 (see column W, this number will increase given some lines were flown multiple times)

• Reports
• Quicklooks organized by day of sortie

NASA5 and the LVIS team conducted science sorties (91 flight hours), including during the two transit legs, between 12 July and 7 August 2019 for the Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment. Targets requested by the Science Team included TomoSAR swaths at BERMS and Delta Junction for NISAR; underflights of IceSAT-2 Reference Ground Tracks; first-time observations and revisits of L-ban SAR swaths across the ABoVE domain for the Active Layer Working Group; opportunistic data acquisition of the Shovel Creek fire perimeter near Fairbanks, including reflights of an line flown in 2014 by G-LiHT; NGEE-Arctic sites in Barrow and the Seward Peninsula; and numerous burn scars around Yellowknife/Great Slave Lake for the Phase 2 Wildfire projects. Weather provided daily challenges to acquisition, but due to the excellent performance of the LVIS instruments and NASA5’s extended range and duration, in the end, the only targets not acquired were the Anaktuvuk Burn Scar on the North Slope of Alaska, and two SAR swaths on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.

• Preliminary LVIS quality quicklooks organized by day of sortie
• Factsheet (PPT)
• Flightlines (KMZ)

NASA conducted L-band SAR flights 4-17 September, 2019, repeating lines flown during the 2017 and 2018 campaigns to continue the multi-year time series, and enable accurate interferometric differencing and comparisons of interannual variability in permafrost active layer thickness, thermokarst, post-fire permafrost degradation and boreal forest structure. Sites included the BERMS site in Saskatchewan, the Peace-Athabascan Delta, road-accessible sites near Yellowknife and Inuvik, and sites in Alaska and Yukon that were of greatest interest to the SAR Working Group. The L-band SAR flights provide key precursor data for NASA’s upcoming NISAR satellite mission.

• Reports

• Daily Flight Reports