Skip to content

Washington – Environmental research and weather forecasting will advance with the February 2014 launch of the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory.

NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), principal partners in the GPM launch, announced December 26 they plan to send the new instrument into space February 27, 2014. GPM’s mission will be to provide more advanced and frequent observations of precipitation worldwide. Greater accuracy in measurement of rain and snowfall will enhance scientific understanding of the water and energy cycles that influence planetary climate.

“Knowing rain and snow amounts accurately over the whole globe is critical to understanding how weather and climate impact agriculture, fresh water availability and responses to natural disasters,” said Michael Freilich, director of NASA’s Earth Science Division, in a press release.

Even though the United States and Japan are taking the lead on GPM’s launch, the data it returns will be pooled with satellite data being collected by instruments supported by an array of international agencies, including the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites, the Centre National D‘Études Spatiales of France and the Indian Space Research Organisation.

U.S. scientific agencies participating in the collaborative project include NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency and the Department of Defense.

“We will use data from the GPM mission not only for Earth science research but to improve weather forecasting and respond to meteorological disasters,” said Shizuo Yamamoto, executive director of JAXA. “We would also like to aid other countries in the Asian region suffering from flood disasters by providing data for flood alert systems. Our dual-frequency precipitation radar, developed with unique Japanese technologies, plays a central role in the GPM mission.”

GPM will build on the data from a previous mission, the Tropical Rainfall Monitoring Mission (TRMM), another NASA-JAXA collaboration launched in 1997. The mission showed the benefit of merging rainfall information from a number of different satellites, according to NASA. The mission also confirmed the merit of different data collection methods, which helped improve tropical storm tracking and estimation of rainfall volume and timing.

Tropical Rainfall had a limited mission to measure moderate to heavy rainfall in the tropics. GPM will be measuring precipitation globally, in the mid-latitudes, the tropics and the poles, with the additional capability to measure light precipitation particles.

GPM will also carry a specialized radar instrument that has never operated in space before and will provide three-dimensional measurements of storm fronts. Other instruments will be set to collect data that will provide further insight into how precipitation processes might be affected by human activities, according to a GPM mission concept statement.

GPM was assembled in the United States at NASA’s Goddard Space Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and shipped to the launch site at Tanegashima Space Center on Japan’s Tanegashima Island in November. In mid-December, engineers and technicians tested each of the craft’s systems to ensure that it is ready for launch.

Source

(Dec 2013) MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.—Skybox Imaging (Skybox) announced today the release of the world’s first high-resolution, high-definition video of Earth taken by a commercial remote sensing satellite.

These videos were taken by SkySat-1, the first of Skybox’s planned constellation of 24 satellites, and showcase high-resolution views of Tokyo, Bangkok, Baltimore, Las Vegas, and Aleppo, Syria. The video clips have not yet been calibrated or tuned.

SkySat-1 captures up to 90-second video clips at 30 frames per second. The resolution is high enough to view objects like shipping containers that impact the global economy while maintaining a level of clarity that does not determine human activity. To watch the video in 1080p HD resolution, please view on Skybox’s YouTube channel here

SkySat-1 also captures some of the highest quality color imagery of any commercial satellite and is capable of sub-meter native color and near-infrared imagery.

“The most revolutionary fact is that SkySat-1 was built and launched for more than an order of magnitude less cost than traditional sub-meter imaging satellites,” said Tom Ingersoll, CEO of Skybox. “This extremely high performance satellite is made possible by proprietary technologies developed by Skybox, including the integrated satellite and imaging systems designs, which enable Skybox to launch a constellation of satellites that can provide imagery timeliness, quality and dependability that was never before possible.”

The business applications for satellite imagery and now, dynamic satellite video, are innumerable – ranging from supply chain monitoring to maritime awareness, industrial plant activity monitoring to environmental and humanitarian relief monitoring.

“This is an important inflection point for the remote sensing industry and for businesses of all sizes around the globe,” said Dan Berkenstock, co-founder and chief product officer of Skybox. “This milestone demonstrates that high-quality, high-resolution imagery can now be delivered in a timely, accessible and affordable way. By leveraging Silicon Valley web technologies, we’re pioneering a data platform that is leading a new generation of applications for the global markets of today and for new markets yet to be realized.”

Skybox has raised $91 million from Khosla Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, Canaan Partners and Norwest Venture Partners.

SkySat-2, an identical version of SkySat-1, is scheduled to launch in early 2014. More unique capabilities based on Skybox’s proprietary technologies will be announced in the near future.

Source
For the latest news, please visit Skybox’s blog
For a gallery of images and video taken from SkySat-1, please go here
SkyNode
Imagery & Video

VANCOUVER, December 30, 2013 | UrtheCast Corp. (TSX:UR) (‘UrtheCast or ‘the Company’) announces that on Dec. 27, 2013, its two Earth observation cameras were installed as planned on the outside of the International Space Station (ISS).

However, Mission Controllers were unable to confirm that the cameras were receiving power from the ISS. As a safety precaution, the cameras were removed and re-stowed inside the ISS pending resolution of the problem. UrtheCast expects to provide further information and the date of the rescheduled space walk by mid-January or sooner as information becomes available. At this time, the Company expects that there will be little or no material impact on its business plan for 2014.

The installation of the cameras proceeded according to plan and without incident. During a spacewalk, Russian cosmonauts were able to transport the cameras to their mounting position and install them quickly and efficiently. However, soon after installation, the Mission Control Centre (MCC) outside of Moscow was unable to receive any data from either camera (contrary to what was reported during the live transmission of the spacewalk). Without this data, engineers in the MCC were not able to confirm that the cameras were receiving the power necessary to allow them to survive the temperature fluctuations of the space environment. As a consequence, senior technical personnel from UrtheCast and RSC Energia (UrtheCast’s Russian partner) jointly decided that the safest and most prudent course of action was to uninstall the cameras and bring them back inside the ISS to be reinstalled at a later date, once the data transmission problem has been solved.

UrtheCast’s Chief Technology Officer, Dr. George Tyc, was present at the MCC throughout the operation, along with the Company’s Chief Engineer for Space Systems, Mr. Greg Giffin. Said Dr. Tyc, “The fact the neither camera could communicate with the MCC strongly suggests that the problem lies inside the ISS and it is not a problem with the cameras or external cables. This kind of issue has been encountered before on the ISS and can be fixed in the near-term. Bringing the cameras back inside to be installed another day was simply the right engineering decision.”

RSC Energia has formed a Commission to quickly analyze and fix the problem and it has already held its first meeting. This is standard procedure at RSC Energia, which has a long and very successful history with manned space systems — it has established a rigorous process to deal quickly and efficiently with anomalies of this type when they occur. The Commission will work in close cooperation with UrtheCast’s engineering team. Once the Commission completes its assessment and has determined the timeline for the fixes required, a second spacewalk will be scheduled to reinstall the cameras.

“Delays like this happen in space. That’s the nature of the business,” explained Scott Larson, UrtheCast’s Chief Executive Officer. “The critical thing is to proceed carefully and deliberately, without taking undue risk. Fortunately, our project is on a manned platform, which gives us the ability to respond to incidents of this kind as they arise. The right decision was made to ensure the long-term success of this joint project. We are grateful for the extraordinary professionalism and dedication of UrtheCast’s and RSC Energia’s technical personnel.”

UrtheCast will provide an update with further progress regarding the cameras’ rescheduled installation as information becomes available, which will be confirmed by the results of the Commission. In the meantime, UrtheCast is focusing its efforts on the commissioning and testing of the other parts of the system and will continue its business development efforts.

About UrtheCast Corp.

UrtheCast Corp. is a Vancouver-based technology company that is developing the world’s first near-live high-definition video feed of Earth, from space. Working with renowned aerospace partners from across the globe, UrtheCast has built, launched, and expects to install and operate, two cameras on the Russian segment of the ISS. Video and still image data captured by the cameras will be downlinked to ground stations across the planet and displayed on the UrtheCast web platform, or distributed directly to exclusive partners and customers. UrtheCast’s cameras will provide high-resolution video and imagery of Earth that will allow for monitoring of the environment, humanitarian relief, social events, agricultural land, etc. Common shares of UrtheCast trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange as ticker ‘UR’.

Source UrtheCast

(23 December 2013) A NASA observatory that will make the most precise, highest-resolution and most complete, space-based measurements of carbon dioxide in Earth’s atmosphere to date has marked a key milestone in preparation for its planned July 2014 launch.

The Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO)-2 spacecraft was moved into a thermal vacuum chamber at Orbital Science Corporation’s Satellite Manufacturing Facility in Gilbert, Ariz., southeast of Phoenix, in late November, where it underwent a series of environmental tests that were completed last week. The thermal vacuum tests are designed to confirm the integrity of the observatory’s electrical connections and to subject the OCO-2 instrument and spacecraft to the extreme hot, cold, airless environment they will encounter once in orbit.

The observatory, consisting of the OCO-2 instrument, built by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., and the Orbital-built OCO-2 spacecraft bus, is continuing its integration and test campaign, scheduled for completion in the spring. The observatory will then be shipped to Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., for final preparations for its planned July 1, 2014, launch.

OCO-2 is NASA’s first mission dedicated to studying atmospheric carbon dioxide and is the latest mission in NASA’s study of the global carbon cycle. Carbon dioxide is the most significant human-produced greenhouse gas and the principal human-produced driver of climate change. The mission will uniformly sample the atmosphere above Earth’s land and ocean, collecting between 100,000 and 200,000 measurements of carbon dioxide concentration over Earth’s sunlit hemisphere every day for at least two years. It will do so with the accuracy, resolution and coverage needed to provide the first complete picture of the regional-scale geographic distribution and seasonal variations of both human and natural sources of carbon dioxide emissions as well as the places where carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere and stored.

Scientists will use OCO-2 mission data to improve global carbon cycle models, better characterize the processes responsible for adding and removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and make more accurate predictions of global climate change.

The mission provides a key new measurement that can be combined with other ground and aircraft measurements and satellite data to answer important questions about the processes that regulate atmospheric carbon dioxide and its role in the carbon cycle and climate. The aim of this information is to help policymakers and business leaders make better decisions to ensure climate stability and retain our quality of life. The mission will also serve as a pathfinder for future long-term satellite missions to monitor carbon dioxide.

OCO-2 is managed by JPL for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Orbital built the spacecraft and provides mission operations under JPL’s leadership. The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.

(source: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory)
and Spacenewsfeed

GeoMaritime 2014 brings together the key players in the maritime industry to develop the value of marine geospatial information.

Delivering key stakeholders from industry, defence, government, nautical agencies and commercial organisations, this is the new opportunity to get to grip with key issues including interoperability, data collection, analysis and sharing, effective decision support and standards and format.

Key speakers include:

  • Lieutenant Commander Luís Miguel Cardoso Pércio Bessa Pacheco, Navy Staff Policy and Planning Division, PORTUGUESE NAVY
  • Chris Parry MBE, Head of Fleet AWNIS Unit & UK AWNIS Capability, DEFENCE MARITIME GEOSPATIAL INTELLIGENCE CENTRE
  • Rear Admiral Tom Karsten, UK National Hydrographer, UNITED KINGDOM HYDROGRAPHIC OFFICE (UKHO)
  • Jens Peter Hartmann, Senior Advisor, DANISH GEODATA AGENCY
  • Conor Delaney, Senior Scientist –Joint Research Centre, EUROPEAN COMMISSION
  • Fahad Al-Amri, Senior Engineer , Hydrographic Survey Unit, SAUDI ARAMCO

Learn more:


Satellite observations are a key element in an integrated and sustained climate observing system and have been critically important for monitoring and understanding the Earth’s climate system during the past several decades.

The expected completion of the IPCC Fifth Assessment (AR5) in 2013-2014 makes it timely to discuss these achievements, to assess future opportunities and challenges with satellite derived climate information, and to provide guidance on future priorities.

The symposium will be an important step towards defining requirements, and the further development of an efficient and sustained international space-based Earth observing system.
This symposium is intended to bring together the international experts in climate observations, research, analysis and modelling to present and discuss results from their studies, with a particular emphasis on the role of space-based Earth observations

in improving our knowledge of the current climate at global and regional scales, and in the assessment of models used for climate projections.

Visit us on www.eumetsat.int
www.theclimatesymposium2014.com

Articles about: Interview with Philippe Brunet, EC’s Emergency Response Coordination, Urban Atlas, Training the future users of Copernicus, Copernicus Emergency Management, ….


In the field

In motion

Business Corner

Shortcuts

The 6th Conference on European Union Space Policy will take place at the European Commission’s Charlemagne Building, in Brussels, Belgium on January 28 and 29, 2014.

Registration is now open. Online registration closes January 22, 2014.

The theme is “What Direction for Europe in Space Between Now and 2020?.” The conference is sponsored by the presidents of the European Commission, the European Council and the European Parliament.

The issues under discussion during the plenary sessions are:

  • European Space Industry: Facing the Challenge of Competitiveness
  • International Dimension of Space: Cooperation and Competitiveness
  • EU Space Programmes: Prospective State-of-Play
  • The Growing Role of Satellite Telecommunications, and New Challenges for Operators
  • What Are the New Challenges and Opportunities for Europe in Space?
  • The Defence and Security Dimension of Space Services and Activities

The keynote speaker on January 29 will be Antonio Tajani, vice-president of the European Commission.
Other morning speakers include the Greek Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Networks, Presidency of the Council of the EU; the President of Eurospace; the President of ESOA.

This year, organizers emphasize the need to examine the future of Europe in Space at the start of the European Union’s Multiannual Financial Framework for the years 2014-20, and the critical decisions the EU and the European Space Agency must make in order to pursue the current EU space programmes, such as EGNOS, Galileo and Copernicus, and to launch new initiatives, such as Space Surveillance and Tracking (SST).

The conference is free and aimed at decisionmakers in EU governance and industry as well as members of the public, but everyone must register online by January 22, 2014. Those who do not register by that date should contact the conference organizers by email at the address below.
Email:spaceconference@b-bridge.eu
Web Visit Website

[Via Satellite 12-05-13] The recently released 3-D map of the Great Barrier Reef created by the German company EOMAP in conjunction with James Cook University in Australia is one of the more unique projects in the Earth Observation arena. The map covers approximately 350,000 square kilometers at 30-meter horizontal resolution. With this project, EOMAP hopes to send a signal to the market about its ambitions that is as clear as its imaging.


“Not all people and organizations are fully aware of the capabilities [of Earth Observation],” said Thomas Heege, CEO of EOMAP. “When I founded the company there seemed to be a niche in this market and indeed you will not find many EO companies working in this field. The Great Barrier Reef was a good area – well known worldwide – to start with just to get more attention.”

EOMAP is a spinoff of the German Aerospace Center and was supported by the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Business Incubation Center in Bavaria. Mapping the Great Barrier Reef was a strategic demonstration project; it’s waters have been difficult to chart due to the size and complexity of the reef, making it a hazard to ships and difficult for conservation efforts. Using LandSat 7, EOMAP was able to map the surface underneath the water, a process known as bathymetry, at a previously unreached level of detail.

“The process to derive bathymetry is called a physics-based process. That means we use satellite imagery not as imagery and then do some empirical relations to derive certain parameters, but we take up the calibrated satellite images,” explained Heege.

EOMAP’s Modular Inversion and Processing System (MIP), used for satellite-based observations, includes corrections for sun glitter, water depth and albedo from the sea floor and nearby coastlines. The company has traditionally taken projects on an individual basis, but now it hopes to shift from working on a case-by-case schedule to an off-the-shelf method.

“The Great Barrier Reef was one of our first larger areas where we did not work just on behalf of a certain project demanded by a client, but as a demonstrative project,” said Heege. “We expect that for the Great Barrier Reef and other regions worldwide, that if you create the product already, it is much easier for interested users and clients to take it up in the process.”

Most of EOMAP customers come from energy and government markets, which find the company’s bathymetry products particularly useful. “We have industries, for example Shell, or BP or Woodside energy [as customers]. We’ve done contracts for them so they’ve already [experienced] significant savings from bathymetry,” said Heege. “We also have governmental [customers] and for the Great Barrier Reef we expect both sides [to be interested], but initially I think we expect more government take-up because it is a national park.”

Geographies, naturally, play a big part in determining the type of customer. “It depends on the region,” said Heege. “On some regions we have more industrial users; in others, more governmental. In Mexico, we mapped the whole Yucatán coastline down to Belize, for an environmental industry. In the Caspian [Sea] it’s industrial and in the Arabian [Sea] it’s a mix.”

Mapping the Great Barrier Reef marks a turning point from which EOMAP hopes to support future demands with an existing suite of products. “We will have many areas of the work in our off-the-shelf database so clients can directly go and get the bathymetry products they need,” said Heege. The company works with a variety of EO satellite operators including ESA, RapidEye and DigitalGlobe to collect bathymetric observations. EOMAP has used DigitalGlobe’s WorldView 2 satellite and NASA/USGS’s Landsat 7 and Landsat 8 satellites for high quality 2-meter resolution mapping in the past. Now the company is readying itself for the Sentinel 2 satellites, in development by ESA, to provide more complete coverage. EOMAP is working together with the German Aerospace Center and ESA to build the infrastructure necessary to use Sentinel 2.

“Quickbird (a DigitalGlobe satellite) is getting a little older now and the calibration is not as stable. As we see more well calibrated satellites available we can implement them to make more area available,” said Heege. “[Today our] satellite coverage is not yet good enough so we simply don’t have worldwide coverage of the capable areas. This will significantly increase awareness, and we will have a much better worldwide coverage, which we cannot have yet.” From there the company will be able to create a large enough off-the-shelf index, and will use it as the primary method of selling EO data.

Source “EOmap“http://www.eomap.de and satellite.today

27-28 February 2014 – Apulia Region, Italy

NEREUS and its member region Apulia will organize an international workshop aimed at presenting how space uses and applications respond to a number of societal and economic challenges of the everyday life. Bringing together the demand and supply side of space services, the idea is to better understand regional needs and potential benefits of an increased uptake.

The event, mainly addressed to European regions, local authorities and their stakeholders, will feature interventions by representatives of the European Commission, Space Agencies as well as representatives from the academic, research and industrial sectors to share knowledge, experiences and expertise. Thematic and best practice sessions, Region-to-Region (R2R) meetings and round table debates will animate the 2-day event.

A special session will be dedicated to students and young professionals, giving them the opportunity to meet representatives from European institutions, industry and academic sector. Final an exceptional “Space Exhibition” will highlight regional, national and European space activities.

A dedicated programme will give all of you, and accompanying people, the opportunity to visit and discover the most striking tourist attractions of the Region: from the blue sea of the Adriatic cost to the heart of the country side with its elegant baroque towns, and the typical white-washed « trullo »houses.

Please find attached the provisional programme.