Description
Explore a fixed NASA Kennedy Space Center lightning dataset while understanding its geographic scope, derived chart, source fields, and limitations.
This page presents 84 lightning observations returned by the NASA Kennedy Space Center Weather Archive for August 27, 2026. The query covers one UTC day within 9,260 meters of a fixed point near Kennedy Space Center, Florida. It is a compact example of how Tool.io can preserve source records and use the same typed data in a map, chart, and table.
The page is an example dataset, not a live lightning monitor or a worldwide annual statistic. Use it to inspect the records and the presentation system; return to the NASA archive for a different date, location, radius, or current source query.1
When this dataset is useful
Use this dataset when you want a small, inspectable example of event data with time, location, numeric measurements, categories, and source identifiers. Because every view is based on the same portable table contract, it also demonstrates how a dataset can move between general Tool.io renderers without being rewritten for each chart or table component.
- Inspect where archived observations occurred within the selected KSC query radius
- Compare observation counts across ten-minute UTC intervals
- Review the normalized source fields and their units row by row
- Evaluate the shared map, chart, and table presentation contracts on real source data
What this example does not cover
The selected observations do not represent all lightning in Florida, the United States, or the world. They also do not establish an annual count, a climatological trend, or a comparison between regions. Those uses require datasets with explicit and comparable spatial coverage, time coverage, detection methods, and missing-data handling.
How the dataset is presented
Tool.io imported the archive response, combined the separate NASA UTC date and time values into ISO 8601 timestamps, sorted the observations, and derived a polarity category from the sign of signal strength. It also grouped the records into ten-minute intervals for the chart. The source observations themselves remain available in the table rather than being replaced by the aggregate.
- Map
- Plots the latitude and longitude of each archived observation and uses polarity as a visual category.
- Chart
- Counts all observations and the negative- and positive-polarity subsets in each populated ten-minute UTC interval.
- Table
- Preserves timestamps, coordinates, signal strength, derived polarity, uncertainty-ellipse fields, distance from the query center, and NASA source IDs.
Time, location, and units
Times are shown in UTC. Latitude and longitude are decimal degrees, distance is measured from the fixed query center in meters, signal strength is shown in kiloamperes, and the semi-major and semi-minor axes are shown in kilometers. Keeping these units in the schema prevents a renderer from silently reinterpreting the values.
Provenance and license
The dataset records the provider, source page, retrieval time, query parameters, transformations, immutable version, and integrity hashes. NASA is credited as the source. NASA's Science Data Portal describes its default approach for NASA-led mission data and also notes that individual datasets can carry different terms, so the dataset-specific notice remains authoritative.2
Important data limitations
NASA states that users are responsible for validating the archive contents for accuracy and suitability for their intended use. Treat this visualization as an exploratory presentation of archived records, not as an operational warning system or the sole basis for safety, aviation, launch, insurance, or scientific decisions.1
- The example contains one fixed query for one UTC day and is not refreshed live.
- A marker represents the recorded coordinates; it does not depict the complete physical extent of a lightning event.
- Polarity is a Tool.io category derived from the sign of the source signal-strength value.
- Ten-minute counts are derived summaries and should be checked against the source table when individual records matter.
- Apparent clusters can reflect the query, detection system, event timing, and map scale; the page does not estimate detection completeness.
References
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KSC Weather Archive: Lightning Strikes — NASA Kennedy Space Center
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License — NASA Science Data Portal