Illustration of the image coverage (center) of the Upper San Pedro Basin and Walnut Gulch Experimental Watershed leading to the 100s of images and ground data files archived in WIGDA'99.

Water Conservation Laboratory Image and Ground Data Archive (WIGDA'99)

Since 1984, ARS scientists at SWRC and U.S. Water Conservation Laboratory (WCL) have been conducting large-scale, multidisciplinary remote sensing experiments at two Arizona field sites : Maricopa Agricultural Center (MAC) and the Upper San Pedro Basin (USPB). This continuing work has resulted in an accumulation of hundreds of spectral image files from a variety of satellite- and aircraft-based sensors (the "images"), and the association of those images with data files containing high-quality ground-based measurements of soil, plant and atmospheric conditions (the "ground data"). These images and the supporting ground data have been compiled in one location, and transferred in an orderly fashion to compact disks (CD-ROM). Each image on CD-ROM includes a companion "readme" file containing information on the acquisition data and location, processing level, file size and format, and any relevant comments about the image or the archiving procedure. Supporting files of ground, atmospheric and low-altitude aircraft measurements - collectively referred to in WIGDA'99 as "ground data" - were archived with an internal header describing techniques, instrumentation, location and other relevant information. Metadata on all archived images and ground data were entered into an Access database to link the information in the two data sets and to allow easy queries of either image or supporting ground data files. This work will allow long term archiving of and easy access to an exceptional remote sensing data set.