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AeroGRID has announced the availability of wide area aerial photography of South Africa. The imagery, which comprises over 400,000km² of orthophoto coverage includes high resolution photos of Cape Town, is being supplied by Geosense a core AeroGRID partner.

-“Following our recent agreement with Ramani (Nairobi) to distribute their Kenyan photography, this addition of extensive South African aerial photography to our worldwide archive really puts us on the map in Africa,” said Miles Taylor, General Manager. “We expect to extend our online archive to cover Brazil and Japan in the near future which will turn AreroGRID into a global supplier of aerial data from all five continents,” continued Taylor.

The Institut Geographique National (IGN, France) is the national mapping agency for France, with over 1,600 employees and a mandate to collect, integrate, manage and distribute reference geographical information for the whole country. IGN France has a year-on-year national update program for aerial photography and uses its fleet of aircraft to capture areas for public departments concerned with many scientific and environmental projects such as logging forest damage, flood and oil slick monitoring, surveys of archaeological sites and night flights to measure light pollution.

CNIG Spain is the commercial department for Instituto Geográfico Nacional (IGN-E, Spain). Founded in 1870, IGN-E is the national mapping agency, and, as part of the Ministry of Infrastructures and Transport, is responsible for the observation and maintenance of the national geodetic networks, producing and updating national cartography, producing and maintaining the Spanish Spatial Data Infrastructure and measuring and recording seismic and volcanic activity.

“AeroGRID is proud to be able to work with these two highly respected National Mapping Agencies and we are delighted to be able to add full online coverage of both France and Spain to our core datasets of Western Europe. This enables us to provide a continuous dataset of more than 1 million square miles (1.7 million km²) to our customers across the world” said Miles Taylor, General Manager. “Our role is to make all this imagery available to the multinational audience, thereby making the procurement of worldwide aerial imagery much more convenient and cost effective,” continued Taylor.

“IGN France is very satisfied by this agreement with AeroGRID, which will increase the wide dissemination and re-use of its national reference orthophoto collection and enable closer interoperability with IGN Spain,” said Patrice Parisé, General Director.

“CNIG Spain and IGN-E are glad of the cooperation with AeroGRID through this agreement, which is a good example of our data re-use policy for Spanish geographic information, in this case, national orthophoto coverage. These agreements together with IGN-E and IGN-F´s orthophoto data enable AeroGRID to provide a multinational offering and significant value add,” said Sebastian Mas, Director of CNIG.

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The European Environment Agency (EEA) and Esri have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU). The agreement supports the design and development of ways to share and access essential geographic environmental data provided by the agency’s 38 European member countries.

EEA, which already uses Esri’s geographic information system (GIS) products, will now work closely with Esri to improve the agency’s cloud environment map services. European countries will share their environmental data more easily, while nations, agencies, scientists, and policy makers will be able to quickly access and consume the data for viewing and analysis.

“Our partnership with Esri provides us with innovative solutions to reach out to our key stakeholders and present them with timely and relevant information as they need it,” said Jacquie McGlade, EEA’s executive director. “The agency will now also be able to work directly with citizens in the coproduction of knowledge via open access to data, creation of personalized maps, and simple ways of sharing data among social networks. The two-way exchange of knowledge and expertise between Esri and the EEA underlines just how business and the public sector can work well together to build answers for tomorrow’s challenges.”

During the next year, EEA and Esri will work together to develop

  • Cloud architecture that serves the EEA initiatives and European Union directives
  • Data sharing that is in line with the principles of Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) as well as the Shared Environmental Information System
  • Standardized templates and layer definitions based on the Esri Community Maps initiative
  • A collaborative plan supporting EEA’s Eye on Earth initiative

“EEA is a leader in environmental issues and has a high level of expertise,” said Esri president Jack Dangermond. “This alliance brings together EEA’s environmental knowledge and Esri’s technologies, which will greatly benefit Europe’s environmental community. People will share information via the cloud and use applications that will allow them to analyze and create policy regarding quality of the environment and hazards.”

EEA helps the community and member countries make informed decisions about improving the environment, integrating environmental consideration into economic policies, and moving toward sustainability. It is also charged to coordinate the European Environment Information and Observation Network (Eionet). Esri’s complete ArcGIS system plays a prominent role in helping EEA achieve its goal of delivering geographic data management, visualization, and analysis capabilities to environmental information consumers.

About Esri

Since 1969, Esri has been giving customers around the world the power to think and plan geographically. The market leader in GIS, Esri software is used in more than 300,000 organizations worldwide including each of the 200 largest cities in the United States, most national governments, more than two-thirds of Fortune 500 companies, and more than 7,000 colleges and universities. Esri applications, running on more than one million desktops and thousands of Web and enterprise servers, provide the backbone for the world’s mapping and spatial analysis. Esri is the only vendor that provides complete technical solutions for desktop, mobile, server, and Internet platforms. Visit us at http://www.esri.com.

Esri, the Esri globe logo, GIS by Esri, ArcGIS, www.esri.com, and @esri.com are trademarks, registered trademarks, or service marks of Esri in the United States, the European Community, or certain other jurisdictions. Other companies and products mentioned herein may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective trademark owners.

Barbara Shields (press@esri.com)
Phone: 909-793-2853, ext 1-2641

The European Space Agency’s GOCE satellite is again collecting data on Earth’s gravitational field after a computer glitch disrupted the flow of scientific communications to the ground.

GOCE has been out of commission since July, when the arrow-shaped satellite suffered a computer malfunction that engineers later traced to a communications link between processor and telemetry modules in a backup unit.

Ground controllers at the European Space Operations Center in Germany switched GOCE to a redundant B-side computer in February after an unexplained chip failure crippled the primary unit. ESA says the problems are apparently not related.

The July anomaly prevented GOCE science data from reaching the ground, and engineers were devising software patches to connect working functions of the two computers to restore full capacity.

But the recovery came sooner than expected as ESA commanded a rise in temperature inside the satellite’s computer compartment.

“We are very glad that one of the most innovative missions of ESA is back on track,” said Volker Liebig, director of the agency’s Earth observation programs. “I would like to congratulate and thank the teams from ESA and especially industry.”

GOCE resumed normal communications after the temperature increased by about 7 degrees Celsius, according to ESA.

Engineers are still developing software patches to link the two computers should the communications system suffer the same problem again, an ESA statement said.

The $444 million Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer, or GOCE, mission is creating an exceptionally accurate map of the planet’s geoid, a global model illustrating subtle variations in the gravity fields, assuming oceans were motionless.

Scientists use the geoid’s reference surface to compare against measurements of ocean activity, allowing oceanographers to more accurately study ocean circulation and sea level changes.

GOCE’s gradiometer, the mission’s scientific instrument, was turned back on Monday and is working well, said Rune Floberghagen, the satellite’s mission manager.

“With everything back in proper working order, the satellite is now being gently brought back down to its operational status and altitude,” Floberghagen said. “This should be achieved before the end of September.”

Officials raised GOCE’s unusually low orbit by about 10 kilometers, or 6 miles, to buy more time during the recovery effort.

GOCE is circling nearly 165 miles above Earth, an altitude that is prone to fluctuations in atmospheric drag caused by increased solar activity. Controllers boosted the satellite to ensure it would not be dragged back into the atmosphere in case the computer glitch spread to GOCE’s ion thruster or navigation systems.

GOCE’s ion thruster produces a steady stream of thrust to keep the satellite at a stable altitude.

In an Aug. 27 interview, ESA’s chief of Earth observation mission science said the spacecraft is working well besides the unlucky computer mishaps.

Mark Drinkwater, also a former GOCE scientist, said the satellite has enough xenon gas for its ion engine to continue operating through the end of 2012, well beyond the anticipated end of the mission in April 2011.

GOCE has already delivered two-thirds of the gravity data expected from the mission, according to an ESA press release. The mission is designed to produce measurements 100 times better than its predecessors.

“We have a significant degree of data in the back from the nominal mission,” Drinkwater told Spaceflight Now. “We’re making huge scientific progress with the data we’ve already got.”

Source ESA

Landscape managers have traditionally depended upon the use of 2D tools and applications for the development and production of food. However, three-dimensional spatial applications are highly oriented to two things — better communication and higher efficiency.

Restrictions on Russian grain exports, flooding in Pakistan, climate anomalies in Australia and wetness in Canada will all drive food production inputs up, as well as prices. Much more efficiency will be the outcome.

Agron­o­mists think in 3D. Insects fly around fields, water infil­trates down­ward and side­ways in soil, tem­per­a­tures are vari­able across topog­ra­phy — regions and food pro­duc­tion are trans­ported and har­vested over con­tours and across net­works. The processes that occur in agri­cul­tural pro­duc­tion are inher­ently 3D, and under­stand­ing them well is the pri­mary fac­tor in attain­ing top productivity.

Restric­tions on Russ­ian grain exports, flood­ing in Pak­istan, cli­mate anom­alies in Aus­tralia and wet­ness in Canada are only a few of the cur­rent prob­lems that con­fronting the amount of food pro­duc­tion over the short-to-medium term. Already spec­u­la­tors are work­ing at their cal­cu­la­tions and deter­min­ing higher prices, restric­tions and decreased lev­els of grain and other agri­cul­tural prod­ucts ahead.

Now is not the time to bury our heads, but to take action toward not only sta­bi­liz­ing pro­duc­tion and increas­ing it, but to lever­age new tools and tech­nolo­gies toward higher pro­duc­tion and approaches for farm­ing and food efficiency.

There has been no other time in his­tory where so many earth obser­va­tion satel­lites have been in orbit, pro­vid­ing high-resolution images with greater clar­ity and use­ful infor­ma­tion that can sup­port effi­cient agri­cul­tural pro­duc­tion. With GNSS capa­bil­ity already present, we are likely to see a more fully oper­a­tional GLONASS con­stel­la­tion appear­ing soon. Many com­pa­nies are mov­ing away from indi­vid­u­ally focused approaches to sin­gle prod­ucts, and are devel­op­ing inte­grated strate­gies that incor­po­rate geo­mat­ics, GIS and per­haps GNSS or earth obser­va­tion in their col­lec­tive work flows.

If the past few months have been any indi­ca­tion, agri­cul­tural inputs such as fer­til­iz­ers are likely to increase in price as demand grows and more com­pe­ti­tion for lim­ited resources arises.

This will place unique stress on pro­duc­ers, since they will be faced with keep­ing costs under man­age­able lev­els, yet, some­how increas­ing pro­duc­tion to take advan­tage of much higher prices for agri­cul­tural com­modi­ties. This is undoubt­edly going to require some skill and thought­ful approaches. Farm­ing is business.

To meet the chal­lenge food pro­duc­ers will ben­e­fit through think­ing in 3D, more­over, they will solve part of this puz­zle of bal­anc­ing the equa­tion through employ­ing 3D tech­nolo­gies that help them to under­stand the land, processes and fac­tors that con­nect to and result in improved production.

Farm­ing in 3D will mean know­ing the soil in 3D, the crop in 3D and being able to model pro­duc­tion through crop rota­tion, cli­mate and oper­a­tions in 3D. The ‘Dig­i­tal 3D Farm’ is no longer a whim. Con­sider the value of crops that at this point, appear set to increase any­where from 10 to 80% in price.

Again, the task will be to bal­ance ris­ing input costs against rev­enues — and improved dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies can help to tilt that balance.

Source

September 2010 sees the launch of PlanetObserver newly redesigned website with a vibrant new look and new content detailing the company’s product portfolio and know-how.

The French company PlanetObserver, specialised in natural colour satellite imagery, has developed greatly in the past years with new products, new applications, new markets. The newly launched website reflects this new dynamic and the new business development trends within the company.

Featuring a better design, interface and content, the site is still available at www.planetobserver.com both in French and English. Offering improved navigation combined with significant layout updates and reorganized web pages, the website has been designed to highlight the company’s major product ranges : high-quality 2D and 3D satellite imagery which constitute PlanetObserver core business, and a full range of eye-catching communication products (satellite floor maps, 3D virtual globe program, exhibitions, etc.) derived from satellite imagery and aerial photography provided by the French cartographic institute IGN.

The new site also presents a new section “Markets and applications” with case studies and practical examples on how professionals take advantage of our products and images in their industry sector.

In addition, videos, pictures, detailed product brochures and downloadable sample data provide a very comprehensive overview of our products and expertise.
Check out the new image and video galeries highlighting the great diversity of our satellite imagery offering, also available on flickr and Youtube.

Contact : PlanetObserver
Email : msat@planetobserver.com
25 bd Gergovia – 63000 Clermont-Ferrand – France

About PlanetObserver

From its setting-up back in 1989, the French company PlanetObserver, based in Clermont-Ferrand, has been specialized in satellite imagery processing and global imagery dataset production, exclusively in natural colours, a truly innovative concept in the late ’80s. PlanetObserver satellite imagery is now widely used in many industry sectors ranging from IT applications, cartography, web-mapping, special events, museums or broadcasting.

NASA recently celebrated the ten year birthday of the Terra Satellite, which was put to work on February 24, 2000. The Terra Satellite is one of the Earth Observing System (EOS) group of satellites, with the title EOS AM-1.

Terra’s mission is to ultimately collect a 15 year dataset of global information that will tell us about our complicated home.

There is much to the Earth Observation System: There is the computer system that stores and works with the data, called EOSDIS, and the third component of the Earth Observation System is the scientists from all over the world who analyze the data.

The Terra Satellite alone hosts the following systems: ASTER, CERES, MISR, MODIS and MOPITT. Terra has a sister ship, Aqua, that was launched in 2002.

ASTER is the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer. It focuses on the electromagnetic spectrum and collects high resolution images of 14 electromagnetic wavelengths that go from visual spectra, to thermal infrared that is invisible to the human eye. Because it is the only spatial high resolution element of Terra, with 15 to 90 square meters per pixel, it also serves as the “zoom lens” for the other instruments. There are three ASTER telescopes that can cross track, giving stereoscopic imagery for showing the highs and lows of the terrain. To show the international cooperation and collaboration involved in EOS, ASTER was developed by the Japan Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and is maintained by a Joint US/Japanese team.

MISR may have had an impact on examining oil spills with one of its capabilities to capture “…the amount and type of atmospheric aerosol particles, including those formed by natural sources and by human activities”.

MOPITTis the first instrument that can monitor with gas correlation spectroscopy from space. “Its specific focus is on the distribution, transport, sources, and sinks of carbon monoxide and methane in the troposphere.” Since methane has been a major component of the gases released from underground and deep water oil caches, and is the major anthropogenic contributor to “greenhouse gases”, this instrument probably provided incredibly valuable information during the 2010 BP oil spill.

But MODIS is the star of the show in tracking dramatic oil spills. This instrument is held on two of the EOS satellites, Terra and Aqua. Simply put, MODIS sees everything on Earth, every couple of days, in 36 discrete spectral bands. From phytoplankton levels to details of an oil spill, to wispy cirrus clouds, MODIS will capture the data.

A visit to the MODIS page will lead to an animated overview of the way in which this marvel works, not just for oil spills but for fires and other major events on Earth, including the planetary “green wave” that occurs when Spring hits the different parts of the world.

Nasa th/features/oilspill/20100517_ spill.html

Terra-Nasa

Source

The Indian Space Research. Organisation (ISRO) is gearing up to launch four satellites within a span of one week in December, a top space scientist said mid September.

‘We will be launching the satellites this December. Currently the two rockets are being assembled,’ Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) director P.S. Veeraghavan told reporters on the sidelines of a function here

The two rockets that will fly towards the heavens are the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) and the heavier Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV).

According to Veeraghavan, the PSLV will carry three payloads -Resourcesat and two small satellites each weighing around 90 kg made in Singapore and Russia.

The GSLV will launch the INSAT series communication satellite.

Veeraghavan said the space agency is working towards the goal of doubling the number of rocket launches to eight per year.

He said the agency earns around Rs 1,000 crore from selling remote sensing data.

ISRO to launch eight spacecrafts annually

New Delhi (PTI) Sep 15 – ISRO is gearing up to launch eight spacecrafts annually to increase revenue and meet global technology demand, a top official of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre said on Tuesday.

“Right now, we have four launches including GSLVs and PSLVs per year. The process is on to launch eight spacecraft a year to meet global demand,” VSSC Director P.S. Veeraraghavan told reporters on the sidelines of a function here.

On steps taken by ISRO to double the number of launches, he said, “We need to increase throughout in getting various subsystems from industries and then increase our own internal work.”

On the commercial aspect, he said India currently earns about Rs. 1,000 crore through commercial satellite launches.

“Through Indian remote sensing satellite and through other satellite launches, we are getting revenue of Rs. 1,000 crore per year. This is growing at the rate of 20 to 30 per cent every year,” Mr. Veeraraghavan said.

Noting that India has become sixth in the world in space technology, he said ISRO proposed to launch a GSLV and PSLV rocket simultaneously this December within a one week span.

“Schedule launch is going to be in December. Currently, the rocket is getting assembled. PSLV will carry three satellites and GSLV will carry INSAT 5C,” he said.

On Chandrayaan-2 mission, he said it would be launched by GLSV instead of PSLV. “We have already started the process and various payloads have been identified. In Chandrayaan-2 there would be an orbiter, lander and a rover,” he said.

Mr. Veeraraghavan said ISRO is also developing GSLV Mk III to launch a four tonne satellite into geosynchronous transfer orbit.

He also said that ISRO planned to set up its third launch pad for human space mission.

Mr. Veeraraghavan was here to receive ‘PSOM-XL Motorcase’, a device used in the launch of PSLV and Chandrayaan missions, from city-based Ramakrishna Engineering Company.

Source: Press Trust of India

Why don’t we see Bing City Infra-Red, Google Thermal Street View and Nokia Geotagging Spectral Smartphones? Maybe part of it has do with privacy issues, but the technology is already present, only the application is needed. However, there can be little doubt that geospatial and geomatic technology integration can tie thermal imaging sensor data to applications where we live and work.

As energy related topics weave their way through economic debates and discussions related to greater efficiency, the need to not only monitor but to do it on an ever increasing scale is rising. Computer-aided design (CAD) design software can already tie building and structural designs to energy analysis software.

Buildings and other infrastructure are not only about visual design, but functional and operational design – and that means energy analysis.There are more than a few manufacturers of digital airborne cameras that are capable of taking infrared imagery today. And, more than one company is capable of providing images of neighborhoods around the globe. This combination is powerful because these cameras could be providing thermal image analysis for individual homes. If you could subscribe to such a service, would you?

While this imagery is valuable and can provide information that is useful to residents and businesses, when we couple it to other technologies it becomes even more useful and causes innovations leading to new business approaches and models. I mentioned Smartphones at the outset because a thermal imaging smartphone would be a powerful device that crosses home and work use.

Imagine satellite infrared imagery of your home showing heat loss or energy efficiency, then couple that to the whole explosion of Smart Meters and in-home technologies that we are now beginning to see in demonstration and displays. How will you know that the technologies are really working, bill alone?

Lower maintenance? If your living environment suddenly becomes 5 degrees cooler on average, then money may be saved, but how comfortable will you be? Not that I don’t see many advantages to smart grid, only that monitoring will likely grow and I wonder how that will get done?Does anyone know if Street View uses an infrared camera? Perhaps you may have heard about the UltraCAM Xp from Microsoft?

Here is an interesting video of thermal analysis by Aerodata in France. Applanix DSS provides IR solutions as does DiMAC. Assuming all devices will be IR capable in the near future, then the concept of a complete IR solution tying these devices to software for design, energy analysis, GIS modeling and other functions would seem to be near. Usually one only hears about two major infrared applications.

The first is in agricultural and biomass related applications and the second is energy related and includes the monitoring of buildings. While aerial imagery will likely be planimetric from the top down (though products like Pictometry, Blom, Infoterra provide oblique options); the coupling of smartphones and mobile devices with IR adds an important link because it capitalizes upon the potential of 3D modeling, analysis and design that lies ahead.

Building upon IR is very powerful when we consider it against work flows like automatic extraction, modeling 3D environments and the realization of 3D GIS analysis. I think the smartphone and the work being done in smart grids may be the integral links that also tie things together.

Source Vector1Media

After 10 years in orbit and 58277 trips around the earth, the georesearch satellite CHAMP collected material that made for one of the most successful Earth observation missions yet, say researchers.

It was a quick end to a long life for CHAMP, the Challenging Mini Satellite Payload. After 3718 days of providing information to researchers on the ground, the satellite burnt up on September 19, 2010 over the sea of Okhotsk, somewhere between eastern Siberia, the Russian peninsular of Kamchatka and Japan.

It was “one of the most successful observation missions of the Earth’s system,” said Professor Reinhard Huettle, CEO of the Potsdam-based German Research Center for Geosciences, better known by its German acronym, GFZ. This was the center that first designed the CHAMP project in 1995. Since then the satellite has provided geoscientists with groundbreaking new insights.

The ‘Potsdam gravity potato’

The information provided by CHAMP allowed researchers, for instance, to better capture the Earth’s form – dips and bulges included. This allowed researchers to develop an image of Earth not as a perfect sphere but as a ‘floating potato’ – the ‘Potsdam gravity potato’.

This was possible because CHAMP was set on an irregular orbit around the Earth: At times it was more attracted to the Earth, at times less. For the first time, researchers were able to trace the satellite’s path continuously and accurately, to within centimeters, and were able to reconstruct the shape of the Earth second by second.

CHAMP also offered researchers new insights into the Earth’s magnetic field, allowing them to recognize that field strength decreases continuously, particularly in the southern Atlantic Ocean, which in turn leads to frequent disruptions in satellite operation.

What’s more, the satellite allowed for the creation of global maps of important mineral and ore deposits – pointing to iron ore in Kursk, Russia, and diamonds in West Africa – as these deposits could be seen for the first time through analysis of the magnetization of the rock.

Come rain or shine

Measurements taken by the satellite have also been used in weather forecasting and climate research. For the first time in 2006, the British ‘Met Office’ used the satellite’s data to create global weather forecasts. CHAMP data has also been used in centers in Europe, Japan and Canada.

The satellite also proved unexpectedly useful in monitoring space weather, allowing meteorologists to predict storms in the ionosphere, an outer layer of the Earth’s atmosphere, more quickly. These storms can interfere with telecommunications, satellite navigation and radio-radar systems.

15 years of work

The CHAMP project began in 1995 when the German Education and Research Ministry developed a satellite mission as a flagship project for the East German space industry, to try to promote existing knowledge of the field within East Germany.

Five years on, when the 522kg (1150lb) CHAMP satellite was launched, it was originally thought it would stay in orbit for five years at most. But the satellite’s design allowed it such a stable flight, even at a low flight path, that the mission time could be more than doubled.

Author: Nicole Scherschun (skt)
Editor: Cyrus Farivar

Following recovery from a glitch that prevented ESA’s GOCE gravity mission from sending any scientific data to the ground, the satellite has been gently brought back down to its operational altitude and resumed normal service – delivering the most detailed gravity data to date.

Data from GOCE will result in a unique model of the ‘geoid’, which is the surface of an ideal global ocean at rest. It is a crucial reference for accurately measuring ocean circulation, sea-level change and ice dynamics – all affected by climate change.

Volker Liebig, Director of ESA’s Earth Observation Programmes, said,” I am very happy that the scientific measurements now continue and we can profit from the current low solar activity and measure the best-ever geoid.”

To observe the strongest gravity signal possible, the Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Explorer (GOCE) orbits at an exceptionally low altitude: just 255 km above Earth, skimming the fringes of our atmosphere. However, when the telemetry problem was discovered in July, operators raised GOCE’s orbit to 263 km while experts set about fixing it.

The reason for this was to safeguard the sophisticated xenon ion engines, which gently compensate for atmospheric drag in the satellite’s normal low orbit. The thrusters help to keep the satellite stable in ‘free fall’ to prevent any buffeting from the residual air at this low altitude, which could drown out the gravity data.

The telemetry problem was resolved earlier this month and operators have spent the last three weeks gently bringing GOCE back down to the very precise altitude of 254.9 km – within 10 m!

Now back in the correct orbit with all systems fully functional, GOCE is back to its job of mapping Earth’s gravity with unprecedented accuracy and resolution.

ESA’s GOCE Mission Manager, Rune Floberghagen said, “After working hard to resolve the problem we experienced with the telemetry transmission, it certainly feels good to have the satellite back doing its job of measuring of the gravity field.”

Source