This Landsat 8 image from May 24, 2017, shows an enthralling New Zealand landscape. Tongariro National Park surrounds snow-capped Mount Ruapehu on the right, and the boundary of forested Egmont National Park forms a nearly perfect circle on the left. Mount Taranaki marks the center of the park, which is surrounded by green farmland. The white running through the middle of the scene is fog accompanying the Whanganui River.

The scene was downloaded on March 9, 2020, one of over 29,000 Landsat scenes downloaded worldwide that day.

But this scene is special.

The picturesque view of New Zealand’s North Island marks the 100 millionth downloaded from the archive at the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center since Landsat data became freely available on October 1, 2008.

That’s one scene every 3.6 seconds since the open policy began. Ok, we know some of you download gobs of data all at once—that’s just an average.

And it’s a number that wouldn’t be possible if the data weren’t free and open.

These downloads help researchers conduct countless land change studies and provide essential information to help land managers and policy makers make wise decisions about our resources and our environment.

Landsat 7, launched in 1999, and Landsat 8, launched in 2013, together acquire over 1,200 images each day. With the launch of Landsat 9 on the horizon, the amount of acquired data will increase to about 1,500 images each day.