WMO OSCAR | Details for Instrument WAOSS-B

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Instrument: WAOSS-B

Instrument details

Acronym	WAOSS-B
Full name	Wide-Angle Optoelectronic Stereo Scanner, BIRD version
Purpose	High-resolution land observation and disasters monitoring
Short description	2-channel VNIR camera: 0.60-0.67 µm and 0.84-0.90 µm
Background	Consolidated technology
Scanning Technique	Pushbroom; swath 533 km. WAOSS-B points fore-, nadir and aft- for along-track stereoscopy
Resolution	185 m
Coverage / Cycle	Global coverage in 5 days
Mass	8.4 kg	Power	18 W	Data Rate	500 kbps

Providing Agency	DLR
Instrument Maturity	Flown on an R&D satellite
Utilization Period:	2002 to 2007
Last update:	2020-01-07

Detailed characteristics

Satellites this instrument is flying on

Note: a red tag indicates satellites no longer operational, a green tag indicates operational satellites, a blue tag indicates future satellites

Bi-spectral Infra-Red Detection (DLR)
- BIRD (see instrument status) Jan 2002 - Jul 2007

Instrument classification

Earth observation instrument
Passive optical radiometer or spectrometer
High resolution optical imager

WIGOS Subcomponents

Subcomponent 1
High-resolution multi-spectral VIS/IR imagers
High-resolution multi-spectral VIS/IR imager

Mission objectives

Primary mission objectives

Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI)

Evaluation of Measurements

The following list indicates which measurements can typically be retrieved from this category of instrument. To see a full Gap Analysis by Variable, click on the respective variable.

Note: table can be sorted by clicking on the column headers
Note: * Primary mission objective.

Variable	Relevance for measuring this variable	Operational limitations	Explanation
Biomass	5 - marginal	Cloud sensitive.. Index only.. Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels. Biomass inferred from NDVI
Cloud cover	5 - marginal	Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Cloud optical depth	4 - fair	Low-density cloud only.. Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Fire fractional cover	2 - very high	Daylight only.. Cloud sensitive.	VIS channels with high resolution for boundary detection
Fraction of vegetated land	2 - very high	Cloud sensitive.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Glacier cover	4 - fair	Cloud sensitive.. Long time for mapping.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Land cover	2 - very high	Cloud sensitive.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Leaf Area Index (LAI)	4 - fair	Cloud sensitive.. Daylight only.. Infrequent coverage.	VIS and NIR channels. LAI inferred from NDVI
Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI)*	2 - very high	Cloud sensitive.. Infrequent coverage.	VIS and NIR channels
Short-wave cloud reflectance	5 - marginal	Infrequent coverage.	VIS and NIR channels. Unsuitable dynamic range (saturation)
Snow cover	4 - fair	Cloud sensitive.. Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Soil moisture at surface	5 - marginal	Cloud sensitive.. Index only.. Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels. Soil moisture inferred from differential brightness
Soil type	2 - very high	Cloud sensitive.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Upward short-wave irradiance at TOA	5 - marginal	Spectral interpolation needed.. Information on BRDF needed.. Infrequent coverage.	VIS and NIR channels
Vegetation type	3 - high	Cloud sensitive.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Aerosol volcanic ash	5 - marginal	Cloud sensitive.. Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Aerosol volcanic ash Total Column	5 - marginal	Cloud sensitive.. Infrequent coverage.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR channels
Sea-ice cover	5 - marginal	Cloud sensitive.. Daylight only.	VIS and NIR (for contour enhancement) channels