The European Sentinel-6 satellite will fly over the Earth next year to monitor the rise in the level of the oceans from space, which is accelerating due to climate change.
From a height of 1,336 kilometers with respect to our planet, according to Space Daily, the Sentinel-6 will complete an orbit every 112 minutes and will pass over every point on Earth every ten days, which will allow you to obtain height data of the level of the seas three times a month.
Before that, the satellite has to pass a series of demanding tests that are carried out in a place called ‘white room’, which the IABG company has in the German town of Ottobrunn, where it will remain until its transfer to the United States to be launched in November of the year 2020.
The director of Earth observation programs at the European Space Agency (ESA), Josef Aschbacher, has been “tremendously proud to see the entire satellite in sight in the white room” and stressed the importance of his mission: register the increase in the level of the oceans (about 8.3 centimeters since 1993), which is becoming faster and is one of the signs of the climate crisis.
The Sentinel-6 draws attention for its house shape and, once in orbit, when you open the solar panels fully, you will remember the top of a Swiss chalet, with its gable roof, although golden in color.
The satellite weighs about 1.5 tons and is about five meters long,
The mission is led by Europe and is carried out in collaboration with NASA, which contributes approximately half of the 800 million euros of the total project budget.
This grant was approved before the arrival of Donald Trump to the United States government.
Source: Elconfidencial
