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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.

  • CryoSat

    CryoSat determines variations in the thickness of continental ice sheets and marine ice cover. Europe's first ice mission is an advanced radar altimeter specifically designed to monitor the most dynamic sections of Earth's cryosphere.

  • SMOS

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

  • Biomass

    The objective of the Biomass mission is to determine the global distribution of forest biomass.

  • PROBA-V

    The PROBA-V mission provides multispectral images to study the evolution of the vegetation cover on a daily and global basis.

  • PROBA-1

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

  • 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.

  • 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.

  • HydroGNSS

    HydroGNSS is a microsatellite mission, which is part of the Scout framework, and consists of a GNSS-R (Global Navigation Satellite System Reflectometry) constellation that primarily addresses land. Scout missions are a new element in ESA's Earth Observation FutureEO Programme.

  • NovaSAR-1

    Launched on 16 September 2018, NovaSAR-1 features an S-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) instrument offering a variety of modes with different resolutions and swath widths.

  • MOS-1/1B

    MOS-1 and 1B, Japan’s first marine observation satellites, were designed to monitor ocean currents, sea surface temperature, atmospheric water vapour, ocean chlorophyll levels, precipitation, and land vegetation.

  • 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.

  • SAOCOM

    The SAOCOM (SAtélite Argentino de Observación COn Microondas) satellite series represents Argentina's approved polarimetric L-band SAR constellation of two spacecraft. It's objective is to provide an effective Earth observation and disaster monitoring capability.

  • Copernicus Sentinel-1

    The Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission comprises a constellation of two polar-orbiting satellites, operating day and night performing C-band synthetic aperture radar imaging, enabling them to acquire imagery regardless of the weather.

  • WorldView-4

    WorldView-4 was an imaging and environment-monitoring satellite from Maxar of the United States, which offered very high resolution imagery.

  • RADARSAT

    The RADARSAT programme consists of a pair of remote sensing satellites from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

  • NOAA POES

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

  • 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.

  • SPOT

    The SPOT (from French "Satellite pour l'Observation de la Terre") series of missions has been supplying high-resolution, wide-area optical imagery since 1986.

  • SPOT 7

    SPOT 7 (also known as Azersky), like all of the other SPOT missions, was aimed at supplying high-resolution, wide-area optical imagery.

  • SPOT 6

    SPOT 6, like all the SPOT missions, is aimed at supplying high-resolution, wide-area optical imagery.