Data from the DLR FireBIRD mission

The successful launch of the BIROS satellite in June 2016 followed the Technology Experiments Carrier - TET-1 satellite system, launched in 2012, and thus completed the FireBIRD mission. Based on DLR’s Bi-Spectral and Infrared Remote Detection (BIRD) sensor system (2001-2004) and its thermal infrared sensor concept, the scientific small-satellite mission aims at detecting high temperature anomalies with a special focus on wild fire detection and fire characterization. The main advantage of FireBIRD data is the higher spatial resolution and extended dynamic range of the mid-wave (MWIR) and long-wave thermal (LWIR) channels with 320 m pixel size compared to other thermal satellite data like MODIS or Sentinel 3 SLTSR with 1 km spatial resolution. The repetition rate for both satellites is on average 3 days, due to off-nadir viewing capabilities of the satellites also several image acquisitions are possible on consecutive days for the same location. At DLR processing chains have been implemented for near-real-time processing L1B and L2 level data. While the Level 1B data sets represent Top-of-Atmosphere radiances, the L2 data show hot spots as well as derived fire radiative power and fire temperature of the detected fire clusters. The implemented fire detection algorithm adapts the method proposed by Zhukov for BIRD, which makes use of the bi-spectral method using MWIR and TIR channel. The poster will present the FireBIRD mission, Show examples of data and application as well as the data access.