BioSCape: AVIRIS-NG L2 Orthocorrected Surface Reflectance Biodiversity Survey of the Cape (BioSCape)

This dataset contains Level 2A (L2A) orthocorrected surface reflectance products from the Airborne Visible / Infrared Imaging Spectrometer-Next Generation (AVIRIS-NG) instrument acquired in October-November 2023 for the Biodiversity Survey of the Cape (BioSCape), an international collaboration between the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the South African National Space Agency (SANSA) to study biodiversity in South Africa's Greater Cape Floristic Region (GCFR). Surface hemispherical directional reflectance was derived from calibrated radiance using an optimal estimation algorithm. For each flight line, three file types are included: orthocorrected surface reflectance (RFL_ORT) and orthocorrected reflectance uncertainty (UNC_ORT) in netCDF format along with a GeoTIFF quicklook image. All file types include data projected in a UTM coordinate system. Estimates of aerosol optical thickness and water vapor thickness are also included. The NASA AVIRIS-NG is a pushbroom spectral mapping system with high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), designed and toleranced for high performance spectroscopy. AVIRIS-NG measures reflected radiance at 5-nm intervals in the Visible to Shortwave Infrared (VSWIR) spectral range from 380-2510 nm. The AVIRIS-NG sensor has a 1 milliradian instantaneous field of view, providing altitude dependent ground sampling distances from 20 m to sub meter range. The AVIRIS-NG was flown on a NASA Gulfstream III aircraft. These AVIRIS-NG L2A data are provided in NetCDF format.