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tech2 News StaffNovember 23 2020 11:29:09 CEST
A US-European satellite designed to extend a decade-long measurement of global sea surface heights was launched into Earth orbit from California on Saturday.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the satellite took off from Vandenberg Air Force Base at 10:47 pm IST (9:17 am PST) and moved south over the Pacific Ocean. The first stage of the Falcon returned to the launch site and landed for reuse.
Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite was released from the second stage about an hour later. He then deployed his solar panels and made first contact with the controllers at a ground station in Alaska
ESA and NASA launched the # Sentinel6 Michael Freilich launch on Sunday. Image credit: ESA / Twitter
Satellites for sea monitoring
Sentinel-6a will be the first of two identical satellites – the second launched in five years – that will provide unprecedented precision measurements until at least 2030.
The satellite twins will measure sea level rise, monitoring changes that threaten to end tens of millions of lives within a generation.
Each Sentinel-6 probe carries a radar altimeter, which measures the time it takes for radar pulses to reach the Earth’s surface and back.
The satellites will circle the planet in the same orbit as previous missions that have provided sea surface height data for the past three decades, mapping 95% of Earth’s ice-free ocean every ten days.
Named after a former NASA official who played a key role in the development of space oceanography, the satellite’s primary instrument is a highly accurate radar altimeter that will bounce energy off the sea surface as it crosses Earth’s oceans. Sentinel-6B will ensure the continuity of the record.
The Copernicus Sentinel-6 mission is a collaboration of the European Commission, the European Space Agency (ESA), EUMETSAT, NASA and the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The Sentinel satellites are the size and shape of a large minivan topped with tilted solar panels and weigh nearly 1,200 pounds, including rocket fuel.
They are designed to last five and a half years but could provide much longer data. Europe and the United States share the $ 1.1 billion (€ 900 million) cost of the mission, which includes the twin satellite.
According to a declaration From ESA, over the past three decades, the Franco-US mission series Topex-Poseidon and Jason have provided space-based sea level measurements alongside ESA’s previous ERS and Envisat satellites and CryoSat and Copernicus Sentinel-3. These twin satellites will continue to provide data as accelerating sea level rise is likely the impact of climate change that will affect the largest number of people over the next three decades.
Nearly 800 million people live less than five meters above sea level and even a sea level rise of just a few centimeters can translate into far greater damage from high tides and storm surges.
Sea surface heights are affected by the warming and cooling of water, allowing scientists to use altimeter data to detect weather conditions such as warm El Nino and cool La Nina.
New Copernicus # Sentinel6 satellite launch to monitor sea level rise: https://t.co/diEOAWTWl5 #SpaceCare # Space4Climate pic.twitter.com/YgN3PZriRX
– ESA (@esa) November 21, 2020
The measurements are also important in understanding the general sea level rise due to global warming that scientists warn is a risk to the world’s coasts and to billions of people.
“Our Earth is a closely related system of dynamics between earth, ocean, ice, atmosphere and, of course, our human communities too, and that system is changing,” said Karen St. Germain, director of the Division of Earth Sciences. by NASA, in a pre-launch briefing on Friday.
“Since 70 percent of the earth’s surface is made up of the ocean, the oceans play a huge role in how the whole system changes,” he said.
# Sentinel6 we hear you!
The North Pole satellite station in Alaska has captured the spacecraft’s first signals from space and is docked to the new mission. Incoming broadcast #ESOC #mission control loud and clear.#SignalAquired📶#AOS#AcqusitionOfSignal pic.twitter.com/zHAo5lClU0
– ESA Operations (@esaoperations) November 21, 2020
With inputs by wires
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