European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites
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EUMETSAT is an intergovernmental organisation created through an international convention agreed by 19 European Member States: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, and the United Kingdom. These States fund the EUMETSAT programs and are the principal users of the systems. EUMETSAT also has eleven Cooperating States. Cooperation agreements with the Czech Republic, Iceland, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Croatia, Poland, Bulgaria, Slovenia and Romania have entered into force whereas the Agreement with Serbia is to be ratified in the near future. EUMETSAT was established in 1983.
EUMETSAT's primary objective is to establish, maintain and exploit European systems of operational meteorological satellites. EUMETSAT is responsible for the launch and operation of the satellites and for delivering satellite data to end-users as well as contributing to the operational monitoring of climate and the detection of global climate changes.
The activities of EUMETSAT contribute to a global meteorological satellite observing system coordinated with other space-faring nations.
Satellite observations are an essential input to numerical weather prediction systems and also assist the human forecaster in the diagnosis of potentially hazardous weather developments. Of growing importance is the capacity of weather satellites to gather long term measurements from space in support of climate change studies.
EUMETSAT is not part of the European Union.
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[edit] Satellite programmes
[edit] Geostationary satellites
See Meteosat.
[edit] Polar satellites
[edit] EUMETSAT Polar System
- See the MetOp article for the satellites.
While geostationary satellites provide a continuous view of the earth disc from an apparently stationary position in space, the instruments on polar orbiting satellites, flying at a much lower altitude, provide more precise details about atmospheric temperature and moisture profiles, although with a less frequent global coverage.
The lack of observational coverage in certain parts of the globe, particularly the Pacific Ocean and continents of the southern hemisphere, has led to the increasingly important role for polar orbiting satellite data in numerical weather prediction and climate monitoring.
From 2006, the continuous view of the Earth provided by Meteosat-8 is expected to be complemented by data from the first operational European meteorological satellite flying in the lower orbit — MetOp.
Positioned at approximately 850 km above the Earth, special instruments on board this spacecraft will be able to deliver far more precise details about atmospheric temperature and moisture profiles than a geostationary satellite.
EUMETSAT Polar System (EPS) satellites will also ensure that the more remote regions of the globe, particularly in Northern Europe as well as the oceans of the Southern hemisphere, will be fully covered.
The three MetOp satellites form the space segment of EPS. The first satellite, MetOp A (also called Metop-2, because it was the second satellite to enter production, but not to be completed), was successfully launched by a Russian Soyuz rocket from Baikonur on October 19, 2006, at 22:28 Baikonur time (16:28 UTC).
The satellite was initially controlled by ESOC for the LEOP phase immediately following launch, with control handed over to Eumetsat around 72 hours after liftoff. Eumetsat's first commands to the satellite were sent at 14:04 UTC on October 22nd, 2006.
Construction on the second satellite, MetOp B, has been completed. Launch is scheduled for 2010, with MetOp C launching sometime in 2014.
[edit] Instruments on MetOp
- A/DCS (Advanced Data Collection System)
- AMSU-A1 and AMSU-A2
- ASCAT Advanced Scatterometer
- AVHRR (Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer)
- GOME-2 (Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment) — instrument to monitor ozone levels
- GRAS (Global navigation satellite systems radio occulation GNSS Receiver for Atmospheric Sounding)
- HIRS (High Resolution Infrared Sounder)
- IASI (Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer)
- MHS (Microwave Humidity Sounder)
- SARP-3 and SARR (Search And Rescue Processor og Search And Rescue Repeater)
- SEM (Space Environment Monitor)
[edit] Jason
The Jason mission is in a planning stage and will eventually measure the altimetry of the global ocean surface.
Jason-2 is planned to fly at an altitude of around 1300 km. The main instruments on board are a radar altimeter, a microwave radiometer, and orbit determination systems. The aim is to measure the global sea surface height to an accuracy of a few cm every 10 days, for determining ocean circulation, climate change and sea level rise.
[edit] External links
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