Meteosat, the new European satellite that will produce forecasts in real time, is on its way
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The Meteosat satellite, Mtg I, takes off on 13 November from the European launch base of Kourou. It is the first of the third series of these satellites, indispensable since 1977 for weather forecasts and the study of the atmosphere and its dynamics. Like its predecessors, it is the result of collaboration between the European Space Agency (ESA) and Eumetsat, the European Meteorological Organization. It will study our planet with new tools to continue the series of weather data that this family of satellites has been sending to the ground for decades 24 hours a day, allowing increasingly precise and reliable forecasts to be made.
The role of Italy
Italy, which has always played a fundamental role in both first and second generation Meteosats, is once again in the front row with Leonardo and above all its two subsidiaries: Thales Alenia Space, prime contractors for ESA it built the satellite in collaboration with Ohb, while Telespazio will follow the delicate phases called Leop, launch and definitive orbiting, a very delicate task that will involve the Fucino center for the first ten days of life of Mtg I. Telespazio is involved in the construction and management of the ground segment, taking care of both data acquisition and satellite control operations as well as the launch and orbit insertion phase, an operation that required five years of preparation, with the involvement of a team of 40 people.
Real-time weather
Mtg I, which will go into geostationary orbit 36,000 km from the planet, is only the first in a series of six Meteosat satellites – five will be operational and one will remain as a reserve – which will be put into orbit in a few years and will operate until 2040, further improving weather forecasts, which are already more than 90% based on satellite data. Especially they will allow the so-called nowcasting, a term that indicates a fundamental new ability: that of producing forecasts in near real time. It is obviously equipped with more performing instruments than the previous series, but above all it has a unique instrument at the moment built after nine years of development, by Leonardo, in the Florence factory. It’s the Lightning Imager, a strategic tool that opens up new scenarios for Earth observation based on weather forecasts.
From the non-negligible altitude in which the satellite will be placed, the “lightning hunter” as it has been renamed, will observe and measure the lightning strikes in the atmosphere, both those that strike the ground and those that strike between a cloud and the other, practically impossible to observe from the ground. One more important fact, hitherto inaccessible: there are an estimated 1.4 billion lightning strikes a year, their study is essential for forecasting severe storms.
Improved resolution
Improved spatial resolution, which now passes to 0.5 kilometers at least, and the amount of data transmitted, which will be tens of times more abundant than the previous generation. The passage time has also improved: in Europe we will have a measurement every 2.5 minutes and every 10 in the whole world.
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