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Urban Sky Open Data

Urban Sky recently provided open and freely available high-resolution aerial and thermal imagery captured from stratospheric Microballoons over the LA fires. The dataset includes both RGB imagery at 10cm resolution and Long-Wave Infrared (LWIR) thermal imagery at 3m resolution, with coverage focused on wildfire events and urban areas. The Microballoon platform operates at altitudes of 15-21km, providing a unique vantage point that avoids interference with firefighting aircraft while maintaining high-resolution imaging capabilities.

Technical Specifications of Images Shared

RGB Imagery Specifications

Parameter Value
Spatial Resolution 10.0 cm
Flight Altitude 15-21 km
Sensor Bands Red, Green, Blue (RGB)
Sensor Color Sampling RGGB color filter array
Sensor Dynamic Range 12 bits per sample
Product Dynamic Range 8 bits per sample
Single Path Swath Width 10.5-15.0 km (altitude dependent)
Off-nadir Look Angle 20° ± 3°
Geolocation Accuracy (CE90) 3 meters
File Format Cloud-optimized GeoTiffs
Processing Non-uniformity correction, Edge preserving noise reduction, Adaptive tonal curves
Compression High-quality YCbCr JPEG

LWIR Thermal Imagery Specifications

Parameter Value
Spatial Resolution 3.0 m
Flight Altitude 15-21 km
Spectral Band 8μm - 14μm
Swath Width 10-18 km (altitude dependent)
Coverage Rate 50-1,500 km² per hour (1000 km²/hr typical)
Scene Dynamic Range High Gain: Up to 140°C, Low Gain: Up to 500°C
Pixel Pitch 12 μm
Thermal Sensitivity 60 mK
Compatible Wind Speeds 5-90 km/hr

Note: STAC metadata was provided with the two images but there href links to the data were missing.

Dataset Preprocessing

The STAC metadata was parsed to create properties for the image band names were captures as red, green, blue or thermal to represent LWIR band.

Citation

Use the following copyright notice for any data products or derivatives:

"©[YEAR] Urban Sky. All Rights Reserved."

where [YEAR] reflects the year of image acquisition.

urbansky

Code Snippet

var HIGHRES_RGB = ee.Image("projects/sat-io/open-datasets/URBAN_SKY/USKY01_D00236_010_11S_20250119_20250125200840_A0_000_000_01");
var LWIR_THERMAL = ee.Image("projects/sat-io/open-datasets/URBAN_SKY/USKY02_D00235_400_11S_20250119_20250121015227_A2_000_000_01");

Map.centerObject(LWIR_THERMAL,10)
Map.addLayer(HIGHRES_RGB.mask(HIGHRES_RGB.gt(0)),{},'High Res RGB 10cm')
Map.addLayer(LWIR_THERMAL, {min: 3, max: 215, palette: ['#313695', '#4575b4', '#74add1', '#abd9e9', '#fee090', '#fdae61', '#f46d43', '#d73027']}, 'LWIR Thermal 3m')

var snazzy = require("users/aazuspan/snazzy:styles");
snazzy.addStyle("https://snazzymaps.com/style/15/subtle-grayscale", "Greyscale");

Sample code: https://code.earthengine.google.com/?scriptPath=users/sat-io/awesome-gee-catalog-examples:global-events-layers/URBAN-SKY-OPENDATA

License

This dataset is made available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).

Contact

For questions about the data or collaboration opportunities, contact Urban Sky at info@urbansky.com

Provided by: Urban Sky

Curated in GEE by: Samapriya Roy

Keywords: aerial imagery, thermal imaging, wildfire monitoring, high-resolution imagery, microballoon, stratospheric imaging, LWIR, RGB imagery

Last updated: 2025-02-11

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