Sentinel-1B is the second satellite of the Sentinel-1 constellation and its prime objective is to monitor the Earth's lands and oceans
Story Summary: Friday 22nd April 2016, Europe's Spaceport, Kourou, French Guiana
The next satellite of the Copernicus Earth Observation Programme, Sentinel-1B, is scheduled for lift off at 21:02 GMT on Friday 22nd April 2016 from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
Sentinel-1B is a polar orbiting satellite designed to provide continuous all-weather, day and night radar images, which will be used for environmental tasks that include maritime surveillance and the monitoring of sea ice, oil spills and the tracking of changes in land use as well as land deformation. Importantly, it is designed to assist in reconnaissance and operational support activities in response to natural disasters such as floods and landslides when the latest data is needed as fast as possible.
Sentinel-1B is the second satellite of the Sentinel-1 mission, a constellation of two identical satellites orbiting 180° apart for optimal global coverage. Sentinel-1A was launched in 2014 and it is now fully operational.
The Sentinel-1 satellites carry an advanced synthetic aperture imaging radar instrument based on heritage from ESA's ERS and Envisat satellites. Unlike visible remote-sensing tools, radar imagers can image the Earth's surface through rain and cloud cover, day or night. This makes it ideal for monitoring the polar regions, which are in darkness for long periods during the year, and for imaging tropical forests and floods, typically shrouded in clouds.
Sentinel-1 delivers radar imagery for numerous applications, and serves both public and commercial operators:
Sentinel-1 is also intended to meet future growth requirements of Copernicus, allowing commercial companies to develop activities is a wide range of application domains.
Since Sentinel-1A became operational in 2014, more than 28,000 users have signed up to access the Sentinel scientific data hub and over 3.8 million Sentinel-1 products corresponding to 4.7 Petabyte of data have been downloaded. Some 470,000 products are currently available for download using the system and three open source software tool boxes have been released to facilitate data access for scientific use.
Among its many assignments, Sentinel-1A has served to monitor sea ice and icebergs in the Arctic; help with assistance for many floods in Europe and in the world; study volcanic eruptions (Fogo, Villarrica, Piton de la Fournaise); and monitor activity as diverse as ice cap loss in Norway's Svalbard Archipelago and Greenland, river navigation and wetland use in Romania, rice monitoring in Asia, and ground movements due to earthquakes that occurred in California, Nepal, Chile, Afghanistan, Greece and Tajikistan.
Sentinel-1A already provides an unprecedented coverage of the sea-ice covered areas of the Earth and has now become a main source of information on the evolving sea-ice cover.
In mid-2016, Sentinel-1A will begin using operationally its on-board laser communications terminal with EDRS -A, the first node in the European Data Relay System (EDRS). This will increase the data download capacity and provide a better data availability timeliness. The capability was demonstrated in November 2014 with Alphasat.
Sentinel-1B will allow to double the data download available to Sentinel 1 users.
The Sentinel-1 pair will provide coverage over European Arctic, land and waters every 1–3 days (depending on latitude) in near real-time, regardless of weather conditions. Radar data will be delivered within an hour of acquisition for relevant areas.
Led by the European Commission (EC) in partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA), Copernicus is the most ambitious Earth observation programme to date.
Through Copernicus, European citizens, policymakers and service providers have free access to a wealth of timely and accurate environmental data on a routine basis.
This innovative civil global monitoring programme is set to make a step change in the way the environment is managed and how everyday lives are safeguarded.
In addition to the dedicated Sentinel missions, Copernicus relies on Contributing Missions. These are designated existing or planned missions from ESA and its Member States, Eumetsat and other European and international third party operators that make their data available for Copernicus.
ESA draws on its 30 years of expertise in space programme development and management to contribute to the success of Copernicus, shaping the future of our planet for the benefit of all.
BROADCAST OPPORTUNITIES DURING LAUNCH
SATELLITE MEDIA TOUR
On launch day (22nd April 2016) ESA's spokespeople and scientists will be available for interview via satellite from Kourou, French Guiana between 0930 – 1130 GMT. The following spokespeople are available for interview:
Volker Liebig Director of Earth Observation Programmes
Josef Aschbacher Head of Programme Planning and Coordination Service, EO Directorate
Guido Levrini Head, Copernicus Space Segment Programme
Pierre Potin Sentinel-1 Mission Manager, EO Directorate
Ramón Torres Head, Sentinel-1 Project, EO Directorate
Simonetta Cheli Head of Coordination Office, EO Directorate
European Broadcasters interested in booking a satellite interview please contact:
ESA TV COVERAGE
ESA TV will be providing extensive coverage of the Sentinel-1 mission.
Several stories featuring the mission and its preparation are being released on ESA TV's FTP server and via satellite on the Europe by Satellite (EbS) service, also available on EBU Worldfeed and Worldlink
On 22nd April the launch will be transmitted live via satellite from Kourou, in cooperation with Arianespace.
All details will be found on ESA TV's site: http://www.esa.int/esatv/Television
Notes to editors:
Further information on Sentinel-1A user / product statistics & applications
Sentinel-1A User & Products Statistics:
Applications Sentinel-1A User & Products Statistics:
Operational sea-ice and iceberg monitoring
Support to Emergency Management
Maritime surveillance
EMSA is gradually introducing in the CleanSeaNet service the use of Sentinel-1 imagery. Member States are also starting operational maritime surveillance activities at national level.
Sea state
Sentinel-1 data is very useful to monitor sea state variables incl. wind, wave and current (note: while wind and wave level 2 components have been validated, the level 2 Radial Velocity Component, ie. current, is under geophysical validation).
Related products are planned to be used by EMSA, by the Copernicus Marine service, as well as operationally for national activities.
Ice sheets monitoring
Sentinel-1A has proven to be extremely performing to support ice sheets monitoring (Greenland and Antarctica), both with systematic acquisitions on critical areas and with large-scale campaigns. Related acceleration maps have been generated by experts for Greenland, it is on-going for Antarctica. This mainly in the frame of CCI Ice Sheets.
Ground deformation – Earthquakes
Interferometry works very well with Sentinel-1.
Sentinel-1A data has been used to characterise major earthquakes that occurred since launch: Napa Valley (California), Nepal, Chile, Afghanistan, Greece (Lefkada), Tajikistan.
Ground deformation – Tectonic processes
Sentinel-1 data time series are used by scientists to monitor tectonic processes at global level, thanks to the systematic observation of global tectonic areas.
Very relevant results have been already obtained, for instance characterisation of the uplift of Campi Flegrei near Naples.
Ground deformation – Volcanoes
Systematic observations of most volcanoes worldwide allow scientists to base their work on Sentinel-1 data time series for the years to come.
Very interesting results were obtained to characterise volcanic eruptions: Fogo Island (Cape Verde), Etna, Piton de la Fournaise (Reunion), Villarrica and Calbuco (Chile).
Ground deformation – Subsidence
With the great repetitiveness ensured by Sentinel-1, many operational services are developing in the area of ground deformation, subsidence in particular. Examples of services:
Ground deformation – Landslides
Sentinel-1 time series are used to monitor large-scale landslides. An excellent example is the operational monitoring of large landslides in Norwegian fjords, involving the national geological survey institution.
Land cover – Agriculture
Excellent results have been obtained with Sentinel-1 to support crop monitoring, rice in particular. This is done in the frame of GEOGLAM, as well as by private companies (e.g. rice monitoring in Asia, to support regional authorities assessment on crop monitoring).
Land cover – Forestry
Sentinel-1 has proved to be very useful to monitor forests and deforestation. Activities are on-going in particular in the frame of GFOI.
Land cover – Hydrology, soil moisture, snow
The great repetitiveness of observations, in particular over Europe (systematic acquisitions of all passes in both ascending and descending), allows services related to water, soil moisture and snow monitoring to develop rapidly.
Snow map evolution in the Alpine Arc have been generated, as well as soil moisture maps at national level (e.g. Austria) and will be generalised at European level and other large relevant areas worldwide.
Monitoring of water resources based on Sentinel-1 data has started. Examples include Africa (Tiger), China (e.g. Poyang Lake).
River and Lake Ice
River ice and lake ice monitoring with Sentinel-1 data has been demonstrated, for instance in Canada.
Others:
Other applications, not expected, have been demonstrated with Sentinel-1.
Examples include:
- ship traffic over River (Danube in Romania)
- characterisation of algae bloom (French Guiana
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