MSSWD - Multi-Spectral Ship Wake Dataset

The Multi-Spectral Ship Wake Dataset (MSSWD) is a dataset designed for ship wake detection in multi-spectral satellite imagery. It is structured as follows:

- Source: 661 image chips derived from 50 Sentinel-2 images, captured by the Multi-Spectral Instrument (MSI) at 10-meter resolution across the visible, near-infrared (VNIR), and short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral bands. The chips come already pre-processed to highlight sea surface features by using a Contrast Limited Adaptive Histogram Equalization (CLAHE) technique. 
  
- Content: The dataset includes 1059 ship wakes, with various configurations such as:
  - Single ship wakes
  - Multiple ship wakes
  - False wakes (e.g., airplane wakes, sea crests)
  - Sea clutter with no visible wakes

- Wake Characteristics: Diverse patterns of ship wakes are captured, including:
  - Vertical, horizontal, and tilted wakes
  - Cluttered sea scenes
  - Partial occlusions due to cloud cover

- Data Quality: Focused on quality over quantity, MSSWD reflects real-world complexity by collecting data in congested, crowded maritime environments.

- Data Labelling: Manually annotated using polygonal annotations to delineate wake contours, which allows:
  - Instance segmentation
  - Enhanced refinement during data augmentation