Skylight Knowledge Base

Data Sources

Owned by Karen Farley
Last updated: Sept 05, 2023
2 min read

Skylight Vessel Information

When viewing a Vessel Details screen in Skylight, you may see instances when additional metadata is available from Global Fishing Watch. Skylight is using data from Global Fishing Watch that was originally collected as the basis for a study, Tracking elusive and shifting identities of the global fishing fleet, published in Science Advances. GFW combined and synthesized satellite vessel tracking data and more than 40 public vessel registries to develop a comprehensive database of known vessel information. 

This is particularly helpful in cases where a vessel is missing its vessel type in AIS, but there is additional information in registry sources aggregated through GFW’s efforts.

It is possible for there to be multiple records in Global Fishing Watch matching the same vessel. Skylight uses a combination of MMSI, Name and IMO to look for matches in the GFW database. When there are multiple records, there will be a page button to scroll between records.

Commercial Data

Skylight has contracted with Maxar to provide commercial data to Skylight users particularly for: 

  • Supporting ongoing monitoring and enforcement efforts with imagery automatically cued by high-risk Skylight events, and 

  • Supporting fisheries operations and patrols where publicly provided data does not provide have coverage

Specifically, Skylight is contracting for data from the following sources (as of June, 2023)

Optical Imagery; WorldView-1,2,3; GeoEye-1;

Satellite Radar; TerraSAR-X, PAZ; and

Radio Frequency: Unseen Labs BRO satellites

 

 

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