Landsat data, shippers can learn whichports are ice free and can chart coursesthrough open waters in largely ice-coveredseas. Canada is using Landsat images toroute ships through its icy Arctic waters.

Perhaps one of Landsat's most dramaticuses for ship guidance in polar watersoccurred during the 1975 scientificexpedition of the U S. Coast Guardicebreaker, Burton Island, in Antarctica'srelatively unexplored. Pine Island Bay.The vessel was gUided through the bay'snearly solid ice pack by cracks that were'clearly visible only in Landsat imagery.

In 1975, Landsat experimenters began astudy to determine how rem,ote sensing bysatellite can aid fishing. The study isaimed at determining the correlationbetween ocean surface conditions and theavailability of two commercially importantfish-menhaden and threadherring -along the coasts of Louisianaand Mississippi. It is expected tocontribute to plans and policies forcatching the maximum amount of fishconsistent with maintaining healthy fishpopulations. An earlier investigationcovering Mississippi Sound revealed arelationship between certain oceanconditions and schools of menhaden.

Landsat imagery also can distinguishthe areas where fresh water from the landand marine (ocean) water mingle. Theseare locations where many fish tend tocongregate.

Landsat has demonstrated an ability tohelp in many other ways. Landsat datahave been used as courtroom evidence inreaching agreement on land development,to show how air pollution can affectweather to aid planning for control offorest fires that plague California everysummer, and to map forest firedestruction in Canada.

offshore currents to control beacherosion, plan harbors, developrecreational areas, and locate offshorefacilities such as 0" dril ing platformsand electric power plants.

Landsat images clearly show ice typesand the distribution, growth, movement,and break-up of sea ice. Such informationis of growing importance to thedistribution of the Arctic's oil andmineral wea tho From this kind of

oil accumulations. The area is not farfrom the Umiat oil field.

Analyses of other Landsat imagesindicate that the faults underlying the richAlaskan North Slope oil deposits extendoffshore into the Arctic ocean. Thisoffshore oil wealth could rival that of theNorth Slope.

Landsat images of test sites in Coloradoshow a correlation between certain typesof fractures and faults and major metalmining areas. andsat imagery of Alaskarevealed many previously unknownfaults and fractures that revised thepotential minerals resources map of thearea. ew Alaskan discoveries of metalssuch as copper and molybdenum haveresulted from use of the map revisedthroug h andsat.

Government jurisdictions and privatecompan ies use Landsat information about

Analysis of this Landsat image ofnorthern Alaska showed alignment oflakes which could only be caused bysubsurface structure. The subterraneanformation is a type associated with oilaccumulation.

Mississippi and Louisiana requested rapiddeliveries of Landsat informationshowing the extent of flooding in theirrespective states by the rampagingMississippi River. They received theinformation in about 36 hours. The samematerial would have taken days to collectby aerial photographs and weeks to doby surface inspection. Foreign nationsthat have employed Landsat to assessflood damage are Pakistan and Australia.

Thailand is acquiring a forestlandinventory by means of Landsat imageryand will use Landsat to monitor theprogress of forest conservation andreforestation.

Landsat has proved a boon togeologists. The spacecraft has revealed amultitude of faults and fractures that areobscured in mosaics made from aerialphotographs. Many of these previouslyundiscovered geologic features correlatewith zones of earthquake activity,landslides and deposits of oil andminerals.

Experimenters concentrating theirattention on mountainous areas ofArkansas found a significant correlationbetween faults and fracture zones,identified through analysis of Landsatimagery, and places where majorlandslides had occurred. This wouldindicate that such Landsat data couldhelp builders of roads and otherstructures in mountainous areas to avoidlandslide-prone locations.

Landsat photographs of a vast area innorthern Alaska revealed an unusualalignment of small lakes that geologiststheorized must be caused by a deep­seated subsurface structure. Magnetic andseismic soundings from aircraft tend toconfirm this hypothe is and indicate thatthe structure is the kind associated with

three quarters of the globe less than onehundredth of one percent (.0001) of thiscan be economically extracted for man swater supply. Landsat can help manidentify and monitor these 'limited waterresources.

Landsat images have been used to showhow much water is available in thousandsof small transient lakes called playas inthe semiarid Texas High Plains. Theplayas are large natural basins thatrainstorms can turn into shallow lakes.Such rainstorms may fill hundreds ofplayas along their route while leavingthose on each side untouched. The playasare a major source of water in the HighPlains. A continuous inventory of water inthe playas is practical only by satellite.

Landsat images can indicate theaccumulation of winter snows in themountains and help to estimate thespringtime run-off of water from meltingsnow that will be available for farming,hydroelectric power, and industrial andconsumer use. The data can also helpassess the severity of flooding. A singleLandsat image can cover an entirewatershed such as the Salt-Verde Watershedin the Arizona Mountains. A mosaic of manyaerial photographs would have to beconstructed to cover th is extensive,sprawling area.

While helping to monitor water qualityin two Virginia reservoirs, Landsatrevealed small lakes that were notdepicted on Virginia area maps. Landsat isalso keeping watch on water levels in anumber of Canadian reservoirs that servehydroelectric power plants.

Landsat imagery is used to helpgovernment and private organizationsassess flood damage and plan disasterrelief and flood control programs. In 1975,for example, the governors of Arkansas,

assemble that they are obsolete by thetime they are printed. n addition, a ge­sca e features that can be recognized iLandsat images are sometimes obscuredin mosaics made from aerial photography.

Using andsat imagery, experimentershave produced in days, current and-usemaps of entire states such asConnecfcut Maryland, Massachuse ts.Minnesota, New Hampshire, ew York,and Rhode Island. They have developedan inventory of Wisconsin wetlands that ismore time y, descrip ive, and accuratethan that obtained by any other method.

Landsat pictures have helped AlaskanIndians select thousa ds of acres oftimberland and m'neral exploration areasfrom vast wi derness tracts offered by thefederal government to settle native claimsgo'ng bac-k to 1867 when the U.S.purchased Alaska from Russ·a.

inety-nine mill"on acres were set asidefor selection of 40 m'llion acres ofsur ace tit e and mineral rights by about210 village and regional corporat'onsrepresenting 100,000 Indians, Eskimos,a d Aleuts.

ocuss"ng on remote Antarctica,Landsat revealed previously unknowngroups of mountains in southern VictoriaLand and at the head of Lambert Glacier.It also disclosed significant changes in thelocation of Burke Island, in the size andposition of the Thwaites ceberg Tongue,and in some 700 kilometers (1200 mi es)of Antarctic coastline.

Iran used Landsat imagery to trace aroute for an al -weather road through theGreat Kavir. The Great Kavir is a saltdesert covered with treacherous swampsand deep depressions t at are frequent yoverlaid with only a thih salt crust thatcould collapse under the unwary traveler.

A thoug water or ice covers more t an

discovered a number of areas suitable forfarming.

However, Landsat's most dramaticdisclosure was a polygonal-shapedpatch of vegetation that stood out fromthe surrounding dry parched land. Thepatch was a ranch where carefulmanagement had prevented the ranch'slivestock from denuding the land. Thelesson here, as in semiarid regionselsewhere, is that grazing rotation andother livestock management techniquesmay prevent encroachments of desertsand dust bowls.

Landsat tests in California andTexas indicated that a satellitesystem may be the best way of monitoringrange conditions for information on theavailability of forage. Such information isimportant in planning livestockproduction.

One advantage that Landsat imageryhas over aerial photography is that asingle Landsat view can cover as mucharea as more than a hundred aerialphotographs. Also, maps produced frothe latter frequently take so much time to

1..\, 'II l:'~ I.' XORTUER,' MEG.\ LOP LIS

Land use map of Connecticut,Massachusetts, and Rhode Island wasdeveloped in a few days from Landsatimagery_

monitoring 320,000 hectares (800,000acres) of cotton in Cal iforn ia, Landsat wasable to pinpoint the time when harvestingand plowdown of cotton plants wouldmost effectively check the bollworm.

In addition, Landsat can help identifyvegetation and other environmentalconditions favorable for breeding of suchharmful insects as the locust.Countermeasures can then be taken intime to prevent troublesome expansionof the insects' populations:

A prolonged drought has broughtstarvation and death to millions in theSahel, a vast African prairie just south ofthe Sahara Desert. At the request of anumber of countries in this area, Landsatsurveyed the Sahel. Among other things it

Polygonal patch of green grass in drab,parched Sahel stands out in this Landsatphotograph. It is a ranch where grazingwas controlled to maintain grass cover.

over Holt County, Nebraska, demonstratethe potential of satellite systems forswift and frequent crop inventories thatare fundamental to accurate crop forecasts.Accurate forecasts can help in assuringthat the labor, fuel, and transportationneeded for crop harvesting and distributionare available.

NASA, the Department of Agriculture,and the National Oceanic andAtmospheric Administration are usingLandsat in support of a Large Area CropInventory Experiment to demonstrate howa satellite system can help forecast theproduction of an important world crop.In this experiment, total wheat acreage,calculated from Landsat surveys iscorrelated with potential yield per acreon the basis of past meteorolog ical datarelationships between weather and cropharvests, to arrive at crop productionforecasts.

If the experiment is successful it couldlead to a world-wide crop forecastingsystem offering significant potentialbenefits. As an example, according to arecent study, a 25-percent improvement inthe accuracy of foreign wheat productionforecasts could yield the United Statesbenefits as much as $200 million annually.

Plans call for the Large Area CropInventory Experiment to be expanded toinclude additional crops. Perhaps theexperiment can lead to a global foodwatch that would help mankind avoiddisastrous food shortages. At the WorldFood Conference in Rome in ovember,1974, United States Secretary of StateHenry A. Kissinger referred to theexperiment as a " prom ising and potentiallyvital contribution to rational planningof global (food) production.

Landsat can also provide guidance forcontrol of crop pests. By repeatedly

AN DSAT DATA AVAILABLE 0 PUBL C

Copies of Landsat data and photographsmay be purchased at reasonable pricesby anyone anywhere from:

Department of nteriorEarth ResourcesObservation Systems Data CenterSioux Fa Is, South Dakota57198

where computers reconstruct the imagesfrom the radio signals to produce blackand white or composite false colorimages. The false color images reveal ordistinguish many features that wouldotherwise be obscure. For example, infalse color, health vegetation may standout in bright red while diseased orinsect-infested vegetation appears gray.

Research teams in the United States and50 other countries and international

I rganizations are studying and applyingdata from Landsat to surveys andassessments of Earth's resources. Groundstations to acquire data from Landsatoperate or are planned on five majorcontinents: Africa, Asia, Europe, orthAmerica, and South America. Landsatdata have been made available to users inmore than 200 countries.

Landsat has enabled agriculturalexperimenters in the United States andother countries to inventory many fields ofdifferent crops in a fraction of the timethat this task would take by other means.For example, investigators used Landsatimages of California's Imperial Valley toinventory more than 25 separate crops in8865 fields covering 186,155 hectares(458,800 acres) in only 40 man-hours.

This experiment and others such as one

the new route was shorter than theprevious one, decreasing the cost ofbuilding the pipeline-a welcome and ,totally unexpected benefit.

Landsat travels in a north-south circularorbit at an altitude of about 920 kilometers(570 miles). Its coverage of Earth

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steadily shifts westward as the Earthrotates beneath it. Landsat's orbit is suchthat a single Landsat can report on nearlyevery area of the globe every 18 days.Landsat takes photographic images in thered and green bands of visible light andin the near infrared, which is just beyondwhat the human eye can see.

The satellite converts the images toradio s·gnals which are sent to the ground

tilt I had to pick one spacecraft, oneSpace Age development, to save theworld, I would pick ERTS (Landsat) andthe satellites which I believe will beevolved from it. 1J

James C. FletcherNASA Administrator

One of the most importantachievements of our space program maywell be the capability it has provided forrepeated surveys of global conditionsand resources at minimal cost. Thiscapability is being advanced in ASA sLandsat, originally Earth ResourcesTechnology Satellite (ERTS), program.

Geologists studying Landsat data ofsemiarid areas have discovered fracturesystems associated with water. Guided bythis information, engineers have drilledsuccessful water wells near Flagstaff,Arizona.

Landsat imagery of circulation andsedimentation patterns along seacoastsis being used by Delaware to devise astrategy for deploying equipment tocontain oil spills, by Alaska to aidnavigation in Cook Inlet which servesAnchorage, by California to selectrecreational areas, and by Japan tomonitor pollution in Osaka Bay.

Information about faults and fracturezones derived from Landsat imagery isused in the United States and abroad inselecting locations for nuclear electricpower plants and oil and gas pipelines.For example Landsat imagery revealed afault across the proposed path of a gaspipeline in Bolivia. Using the Landsatinformation, engineers rerouted thepipeline to avoid the fault. As it happened,

Goddard Space Flight Center,Greenbelt, Maryland, manages theLandsat spacecraft, Landsat's Deltalaunch vehicle and the satellite globaltracking and data acquisition network.The launches are supervised by the JohnF. Kennedy Space Center, Florida. TheLarge Area Crop Inventory Experiment ismanaged by the Lyndon B. JohnsonSpace Center, Houston, Texas.

Information received by Landsat's U.S.data acquisition stations at Fairbanks,Alaska; Goldstone, California; andGreenbelt, Maryland, is sent to the NASAData Processing Facility at Goddard. Thefacility can handle some 1300 scenescovering 45 million square kilometers (17million square miles) per week.

Landsat 1 was launched July 23, 1972;Landsat 2, January 22, 1975.

nU.5. GOVERtflEfIT PRINTING OFFiCE: 1976-0-215-332