Discover our week through the lens (28 October – 1 November 2019). To source
Tag Archives | news
Driving into the future
Image: A highly autonomous self-driving shuttle has entered service at ESA’s technical heart. Its official inauguration took place on Tuesday, when it was assigned a suitably spacey name – ‘Orbiter’ – chosen through an employee competition. The Agency’s ESTEC establishment in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, is being used as a testbed for the automated shuttle, to assess its […]
SMOS 10 years in orbit
Video: 00:04:57 SMOS has been in orbit for a decade. This remarkable satellite has not only exceeded its planned life in orbit, but also surpassed its original scientific goals. It was designed to deliver data on soil moisture and ocean salinity which are both crucial components of Earth’s water cycle. By consistently mapping these variables, […]
SMOS 10 years in orbit
Video: 00:04:57 SMOS has been in orbit for a decade. This remarkable satellite has not only exceeded its planned life in orbit, but also surpassed its original scientific goals. It was designed to deliver data on soil moisture and ocean salinity which are both crucial components of Earth’s water cycle. By consistently mapping these variables, […]
Beyond mission (portal homepage)
Beyond mission ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano’s Beyond mission to the International Space Station To source
Antarctic mist
Image: As the Northern hemisphere tucks into longer nights, Antarctica bursts into its season of sunlight. After four months of night, the crew of Concordia research station, located on Dome C in the Antarctic peninsula, saw first light in August , marking the end of the dreaded winter-over, a period of darkness and isolation. The […]
Tracking Typhoon Hagibis from space
Hagibis was the biggest typhoon to hit Japan in decades. With extreme events like this likely to increase in number and in severity as a consequence of climate change, satellites are playing an increasingly important role in understanding and tracking huge storms. To source
A ghost in the Pleiades
Image: This ghostly image shows what can happen when an interstellar cloud passes too close to a star. Barnard’s Merope Nebula, also known as IC 349, is a cloud of interstellar gas and dust travelling through the Pleiades star cluster at a relative speed of 11 kilometres per second. It is passing close to the […]
Contract seals deal for Biomass satellite’s ride into space
Today, ESA and Arianespace signed a contract that secures the launch of the Earth Explorer Biomass satellite. With liftoff scheduled for 2022 on a Vega launch vehicle from French Guiana, this new mission is another step closer to mapping the amount of carbon stored in forests and how it changes over time though deforestation, for […]
Week in images
Discover our week through the lens (21-25 October 2019). To source
Is Earth on fire?
Wildfires have been making headlines again this month, with multiple fires burning in Lebanon and California, but these are just some of the many fires 2019 has seen. Fires in the Amazon sparked a global outcry this summer, but fires have also been blazing in the Arctic, France, Greece, Indonesia as well as many other […]
European network of operations centres takes shape
ESA and the French space agency CNES have signed an important agreement that will see the two agencies improve interoperability between their mission control facilities on ground, enhancing the abilities of each organisation in space. To source
European boost to the all-in-one Bartolomeo service for the Space Station
Quick access to space and high-speed data transfer are paving the way for competitive science on the International Space Station. The Bartolomeo external platform received a boost today as ESA and Airbus confirmed their interest in using this new space-based vantage point for several experiments. To source