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  • News (38)
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  • Events (28)
  • Tools (6)
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  • Documents (77)
  • News - Infographics

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    Showcasing success stories from ESA's Heritage Missions

    Find out how ESA's Heritage Space Programme data continue to help, even decades after they finished operations, in our latest infographic.

  • Document - Newsletter

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    Earth Online Newsletter - 08 March 2024

    This issue of the Earth Online Newsletter covers a selection of the latest news and events from ESA.

  • News - Data Release news

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    FDR4ALT - ESA unveils new cutting-edge ERS/Envisat Altimeter and Microwave Radiometer Datasets

    The European Space Agency (ESA) has developed a comprehensive suite of innovative Earth system data records as part of the Fundamental Data Records for Altimetry project - FDR4ALT.

  • Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

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    Atmospheric Thematic Data Product [MWR_TDPATM]

    This is the Atmospheric Thematic Data Product (TDP) V1 resulting from the ESA FDR4ALT project and containing Total Column Water Vapour (TCWV), Cloud Liquid Water Path (LWP), Atmospheric Attenuation of the altimeter backscattering coefficient at Ku-band (AttKu), and Wet Tropospheric Correction (WTC), retrieved from observations of the Microwave Radiometer (MWR) instruments flown on-board the ERS-1, and ERS-2, and Envisat satellites. Compared to existing datasets, the Atmospheric TDP demonstrates notable improvements in several aspects: Improved temporal coverage, especially for ERS-2 Improved L0 -> 1 processing Two different corrections are provided based on a neural network retrieval or on a 1D-VAR approach The FDR4ALT products are available in NetCDF format. Free standard tools for reading NetCDF data can be used. Information for expert altimetry users is also available in a dedicated NetCDF group within the products. Please consult the FDR4ALT Product User Guide before using the data. The FDR4ALT datasets represent the new reference data for the ERS/Envisat altimetry missions, superseding any previous mission data. Users are strongly encouraged to make use of these datasets for optimal results.

  • Document - Product Handbook

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    SAR Tropical Oceanic Phenomena Handbook

    ERS SAR Tropical Oceanic Phenomena Handbook.

  • News - General News

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    Go-to guide to Third Party Mission data offering

    ESA’s latest Third Party Missions Data Access Guide has been published, providing technical details and information on available data collections for all current or past Third Party Missions.

  • News - Success Stories

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    Trailblazing ERS-2 mission enables climate change applications

    As ESA’s ERS-2 satellite approaches Earth’s atmosphere for reentry, it’s time to reflect on the mission’s great achievements in powering climate-related applications.

  • Document - Product Handbook

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    SAR Tropical Atmospheric Phenomena Handbook

    ERS SAR Tropical Atmospheric Phenomena Handbook.

  • News - Thematic area articles

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    How to use space data to probe humankind’s ancient past

    Data disseminated by ESA’s Third Party Missions (TPM) programme are enabling archaeological investigations that could help to unravel the mysteries of past societies and cultures.

  • News - Thematic area articles

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    Cloud-free collections key for land monitoring

    Satellite imagery is a crucially important tool for monitoring the land, but cloud cover can often block parts of Earth’s surface from view, limiting subsequent analyses.

  • News - Success Stories

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    Commercial and international data for fire monitoring

    As climate change sparks a surge in the frequency and intensity of wildfires, satellite data disseminated through ESA’s Third Party Missions (TPM) programme are helping scientists to track and investigate these potentially damaging natural events.

  • News - Success Stories

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    ESA missions help to reveal worldwide lake water loss trend

    Climate change, human consumption and sedimentation are depleting more than half of the world’s biggest lakes of water, according to a ground-breaking analysis that drew on three decades of satellite data.

  • News - Success Stories

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    PROBA-V data improve surface albedo products in Africa

    As ESA’s PROBA-V satellite marks its 10-year launch milestone, data tasked during the mission’s lifetime are still being used to assess changes in land cover.

  • News - Thematic area articles

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    Monitoring water on Earth's surface

    ESA's Earth observation satellites are playing a leading role in furthering our understanding of how Earth's terrestrial hydrosphere is being influenced by humankind.

  • News - Data Release news

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    New Landsat RBV data collection opened to users

    ESA is pleased to announce that the Landsat RBV data collection has been opened to users.

  • Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

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    Landsat RBV

    This dataset contains Landsat 3 Return Beam Vidicon (RBV) products, acquired by ESA by the Fucino ground station over its visibility mask. The data (673 scenes) are the result of the digitalization of the original 70 millimetre (mm) black and white film rolls. The RBV instrument was mounted on board the Landsat 1 to 3 satellites between 1972 and 1983, with 80 metre resolution. Three independent co-aligned television cameras, one for each spectral band (band 1: blue-green, band 2: yellow-red, band 3: NIR), constituted this instrument. The RBV system was redesigned for Landsat 3 to use two cameras operating in one broad spectral band (green to near-infrared; 0.505–0.750 µm), mounted side-by-side, with panchromatic spectral response and higher spatial resolution than on Landsat 1 and Landsat 2. Each of the cameras produced a swath of about 90 km (for a total swath of 180 km), with a spatial resolution of 40 m.

  • News - Thematic area articles

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    Global understanding of Earth's land surfaces greatly boosted by satellite data

    ESA perform land surface monitoring with a range of instruments onboard satellites acquiring optical and radar data. Collections of data from these missions are freely available for research purposes.

  • News - Success Stories

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    New worldwide dataset captures the planet in fine detail

    Scientists have developed an open source planetwide dataset of high-resolution Earth observation imagery, thanks to commercial data delivered by ESA’s Third Party Missions (TPM) programme.

  • Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

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    Landsat 7 ETM+ European and Mediterranean Countries Cloud Free Collection

    This dataset contains the cloud-free products from Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper collection acquired over Europe, North Africa and the Middle East; for each scene only one product is selected, with the minimal cloud coverage. The Landsat 7 ETM+ scenes typically cover 185 x 170 km. A standard full scene is nominally centred on the intersection between a Path and Row (the actual image centre can vary by up to 100 m). The data are system corrected.

  • Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

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    Landsat 5 TM European and Mediterranean Countries Cloud Free Collection

    This dataset contains the cloud-free products from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper collection acquired over Europe, North Africa and the Middle East; for each scene only one product is selected, with the minimal cloud coverage. The acquired Landsat TM scene covers approximately 183 x 172.8 km. A standard full scene is nominally centred on the intersection between a path and row (the actual image centre can vary by up to 100 m). The data are system corrected.