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MISSIONS

Explore the European Space Agency's Earth Observation satellite missions. Learn all about ESA's dedicated Earth Explorers or collaborations with other agencies through the Third Party Missions programme.

  • Mission - Earth Explorers

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    SMOS

    The Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission is dedicated to making global observations of soil moisture over land and salinity over oceans.

  • Mission - Earth Explorers

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    FLEX

    The FLEX mission will provide global maps of vegetation fluorescence, which can be converted into an indicator of photosynthetic activity.

  • Mission - Earth Explorers

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    EarthCARE

    EarthCARE will examine the role clouds and aerosols play in trapping infrared radiation emitted from Earth's surface.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    PROBA-1

    PROBA-1 is a technology demonstration satellite that later became an operational Earth observation mission.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    Envisat

    Envisat was ESA's successor to ERS. Envisat carried ten instruments aboard for a wide range of Earth observing fields. The mission was operational from 2002 to 2012.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    ERS

    The ERS programme was composed of two missions, ERS-1 and ERS-2, which together observed the Earth for 20 years, from 1991 to 2011.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    FSSCat

    The FSSCat mission was an innovative concept that consisted of two federated 6-Unit Cubesats, called ³Cat-5/A and ³Cat-5/B, which operated in support of the Copernicus Land and Marine Environment services.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    TanSat

    The TanSat mission is one of the Earth Observation projects managed by the Ministry of Science and Technology of China and is dedicated to detecting and monitoring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    GHGSat

    The GHGSat mission is dedicated to measuring emissions of greenhouse gases.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    GOSAT Series

    The GOSAT series is composed of two environment-monitoring satellites developed by JAXA dedicated to the observation of greenhouse gases.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    Landsat-4 and Landsat-5

    The Landsat-4 and Landsat-5 missions continued the Landsat programme's goal of providing moderate-resolution optical remote sensing for land, coastal areas and shallow waters.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    NOAA POES

    NOAA's AVHRR sensor is carried on the POES mission, a constellation of polar orbiting weather satellites.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    Landsat-1 to Landsat-3

    The Landsat-1 to 3 satellites were the first in the United States' Landsat programme, dedicated to monitoring the Earth's land mass.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    IRS-P6 (ResourceSat-1)

    IRS-P6 (also known as ResourceSat-1) launched on 17 October 2003 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre by the Indian PSLV-C5, and came to an end on 30 September 2013.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    Aura

    NASA's Aura mission studies the chemistry and dynamics of Earth's atmosphere from the ground through the mesosphere.

  • Mission - Meteorological Missions

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    MetOp

    MetOp is a mission dedicated to improving weather forecasts and monitoring Earth's climate.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    SCISAT-1

    SCISAT-1 is designed to make observations of Earth's atmosphere and its main instruments are an optical Fourier transform infrared spectrometer and an ultraviolet spectrophotometer.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    Odin

    Odin is an atmosphere-studying satellite mission from Sweden, Canada, France and Finland.

  • Mission - Heritage Missions

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    Landsat-7

    Landsat-7 is a joint USGS and NASA-led Earth observation mission, which was launched in 1999 and remains operational.

  • Mission - Third Party Missions

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    GOSAT-1

    GOSAT-1 is a Japanese environment-monitoring satellite