Sentinel 2

Sentinel 2 is a future space mission from ESA, the second in GMES program. It will provide multispectral earth observation data providing data continuity of Landsat and SPOT-type missions. The foreseen launch date is around 2013. The mission comprises two satellites simultaneously circulating the earth in the same orbit phased at 180°. The satellites are designed to provide continuous acquisition of all Earth land surfaces between -56° and +84° latitude.

Mission characteristics

• Role: Earth Observation
• Launch date: 2014
• Launch mass: ~1180 kg
• Launcher: Vega or Rockot
• Launch location: Kourou, French Guiana or Plesetsk/Russia
• Orbit: Sun-synchronous
• Altitude: 786 km
• Orbit cycle: ~100 minutes
• Repeat cycle: 5 days with 2 satellites
• Design lifetime: 7.25 years. The satellites carry additional consumables to enable mission extension to at least 12 years.

Instruments

Sentinel 2 spacecrafts carry a single multi-spectral instrument with 13 spectral channels in the visible/near infrared VNIR and short wave infrared spectral range SWIR. The spatial resolution varies between 10, 20, and 60m, the swath width is 290 km.

External links

• Global Monitoring for Environment and Security at ESA
• GMES Sentinel-2 Mission Requirements Document

Applications

• Land cover, usage and change-detection maps
• Risk mapping
• Fast images for disaster relief