“I’d go to meetings and people were just jumping up and down because they had discovered another use for the data.”

“We are in this unique position where we have ice core records from these mountaintops, and Landsat has these detailed images of the glaciers, and if we combine those two data sets, we see clearly what is happening.” 

Landsat satellite imagery is ideal for gauging vegetation cover shifts because it supplies spectral data for surface areas of about 90 square meters – fine enough to track changing spectral signal patterns across large study areas. 

“Landsat has allowed managers to observe regional trends in kelp canopy area and biomass across more than 30 years. This is very valuable.”

"The tracking of over-irrigated areas for targeting irrigation advisory texts was completely dependent on Landsat TIR data."

"If you really want to have a long history of understanding any process in the Earth, Landsat is where you should go."

"Without Landsat we would not have the record we have today about deforestation and changing agriculture across a vast and important biome."

"The value of the Landsat archive is that we have a long-term memory of the changes that have occurred across the Amazon frontier."

"Landsat satellite data are the most important source we have about how much deforestation happens each year across the Amazon."

"Landsat is indispensable for Timelapse in Google Earth—and so much more. Thank you @USGSLandsat @NASA_Landsat program, the world’s only long-term, continuous, data record of the entire Earth’s land surfaces dating back to 1972."

"Landsat provides an unparalleled record of how terrestrial Earth has changed since the early 1970s, closely coinciding with the beginning of rapid environmental change. It provides important historical context for the current state of land cover and land use and provides a reference for identifying abnormal types and rates of change."

"I’m grateful that NASA, USGS, and scientists like William Pecora had the foresight to begin collecting Earth observations a half century ago."