Ground motion by city › Sacramento, CA
Satellite radar (NASA OPERA / Sentinel-1 InSAR) has measured the vertical ground motion under central Sacramento since 2016. Here is the current rate — the ground is sinking.
In plain terms, the long-term trend is within the margin of error — the ground could be stable, sinking, or rising. This is the reading for the city center; the rate can vary block to block, so check the exact address you care about:
See the full Sacramento report · Ground-motion map · developers: API docs.
Ground subsidence — land slowly sinking — can crack foundations, break underground pipes, and worsen flood risk over years. Uplift (rising ground) is usually driven by soil/clay swelling or groundwater rebound. What stresses a building is uneven movement between nearby points, so a single rate is a screening signal: use it to decide whether a closer geotechnical look is worth it.
Satellite radar (InSAR) has measured how the ground across Sacramento has moved, in millimeters per year, since 2016. Negative means sinking (subsidence); positive means rising (uplift). SibFly reads that measurement for any specific Sacramento address.
As rough screening bands on the vertical rate: under about 3 mm/year is essentially stable; 3 to 8 mm/year is notable subsidence worth monitoring; more than 8 mm/year is rapid subsidence worth a closer look. Foundations are stressed by UNEVEN movement between nearby points, not uniform sinking.
Measured, not modeled: NASA's OPERA project processes Copernicus Sentinel-1 radar into ground motion on a 30-meter grid. SibFly reports the value for the exact cell an address falls in, with an uncertainty range and the date of the last observation. It is a screening estimate, not an engineering or survey-grade determination.
Checking whether an address is covered is free. A full measured report is a small flat fee ($0.40). Addresses with no coverage or no reliable radar return are never charged.
Yes. SibFly is also a developer and AI-agent API with batch lookups, a hosted MCP server, and self-service signup. See the docs at sibfly.com/docs.
Screening estimate from satellite radar (NASA OPERA / Sentinel-1 InSAR) at 30 m resolution. Not an engineering or survey-grade determination. © SIB Scientific.