A new dataset has been released for the CIRFAEx campaign, which took place off the coast of Greenland in 2022 to support the development of the upcoming ROSE-L and Sentinel-1 Next Generation missions.

ESA conducts airborne and ground-based campaigns to support the development of new instruments, and calibration and validation of existing instruments. These campaigns simulate satellite-based measurements and are conducted all over the world in support of a wide range of applications.

The goal of the CIRFAEx campaign was to support the ROSE-L and Sentinel-1 Next Generation missions, particularly providing validation of satellite-derived data products produced by the Centre for Integrated Remote Sensing for Arctic Operations (CIRFA).

ROSE-L (Radar Observing System for Europe) is an upcoming Copernicus mission that will acquire L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data. The mission is expected to complement the C-band SAR data provided by current Copernicus missions.

The Sentinel-1 Next Generation mission will provide data continuity for the current Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission, with enhanced performance and the ability to support new applications beyond those Sentinel-1 currently achieves.

During the CIRFAEx campaign, the Norwegian research vessel Kronprins Haakon was used to acquire in-situ measurements of the north-east coast of Greenland and the Belgica Bank, an area of ice that forms over the continental shelf of Greenland. The region has highly variable ice cover characteristics and frequent icebergs, which served as a good test location for sea ice studies.

The team on the Kronprins Haakon acquired data from ground-based ice stations on Greenland’s coast, and deployed drones from the vessel to acquire airborne data. These observations were then compared with data acquired over test sites in the area, from the SAR satellite missions Sentinel-1, RADARSAT-2, ALOS-2, COSMO-SkyMed, TerraSAR-X and ICEYE. A range of missions was selected to provide X-, C-, and L-band data to compare.

The Kronprins Haakon cruise took place from 22 April to 12 May 2022 and successfully acquired data
during excellent weather conditions. The campaign acquired an extensive dataset of multi-frequency
SAR data that is complemented by optical and in-situ observations.
The campaign dataset includes:

• properties of sea ice cores
• surface roughness data
• thin ice properties
• sea ice and snow transects
• snow pits data
• sea ice data
• iceberg observations

The dataset supports science activities for ROSE-L and Sentinel-1 Next Generation, and provides data
useful for sea ice studies.
The dataset is openly available for download following submission of a data access request.
Learn more about the CIRFAEx campaign and how to request the data