Data Access


DISCLAIMER: RealEarth™ serves as a repository for user-generated products. No ownership or availability guarantee is implied.

Browsing Products

Downloading Raw Data

Please contact the site administrator if you are interested in obtaining the raw data or full-size imagery displayed in RealEarth.

Tile Access By Zoom/Column/Row

Requesting Individual Tiles

The fastest and easiest way to access imagery is via direct Tile Pyramid addressing. Data is arranged by product ID (with optional date/time), zoom, column, and row:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/tiles//5/4/5.png
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/tiles//19700101/000000/5/4/5.png
NOTE: Omitting the date and time will always return the latest available tiles for the given product ID. This can cause discontinuities in products with high refresh rates that update while tiles are being served.

Tile Layer

Many tools can visualize tiled imagery via a formatted URL containing product (with optional date/time), zoom, column, and row. For example, ArcGIS Online, Google Maps API (including mobile devices), Leaflet, and many more.

See Embedding for an example TileOverlay in Google Maps.

Example Tile Layer URL for ArcGIS Online:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/tiles//{level}/{col}/{row}.png

Accessing Imagery via WMS

mapserv

RealEarth supports standard GetCapabilities and GetMap requests via mapserv:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/mapserv
Example GetCapabilities:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/mapserv?map=.map&service=wms&version=1.3.0&request=GetCapabilities

RealEarth lists all available times for a given product as separate layers within the mapfile. Every product has a layer named "latest" that contains the most recent data.

Example GetMap:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/mapserv?map=.map&service=wms&version=1.3.0&request=GetMap&layers=latest&crs=EPSG:4326&bbox=-90,-180,90,180&width=640&height=480&format=image/jpeg

KML

For use with Google Earth:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/kml/?products=

THREDDS

THREDDS catalog listing all products, suitable for use with the Catalog Chooser in McIDAS-V:
https://myradar.ssec.wisc.edu/thredds/catalog.xml