INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Update: Launch successful! Aeolus is in orbit and and signal has been acquired
We&re still waiting on solar panel deployment but everything is nominal so far.
FIRST DATA!! #Aeolus
coming in loud
and clear at #Troll
station
and controllers at #ESOC
are seeing their first data from the satellite
mdash; ESA Operations (@esaoperations) August 22, 2018
An
ESA mission 20 years in the making is set to take off today, launching the first satellite to monitor the planet winds directly — and
using a giant laser, at that
Aeolus takes off from French Guiana at nearly midnight CEST, about 2:20 PM Pacific time, and you can watch the launch live here.
Aeolus,
named after the Greek god who was the keeper of the winds, is a satellite designed and approved way back in 1999 but only recently completed
and deemed ready for launch
It essentially a vehicle for a single payload, the Atmospheric Laser Doppler Instrument, or &Aladin,& essentially an orbital lidar
system.
Once in orbit, Aladin will blast the surface with a 10-megawatt ultraviolet laser 50 times per second, tracking the minute changes
evident in the reflected beam caused by air molecules and other matter in the atmosphere
Twenty separate measurements done on the laser light allow the satellite to determine the exact velocity of the wind where it
pointing.
Believe it or not, measuring the wind from space hasn''t really been done
Sure, you can observe cloud patterns and infer that air in some places is behaving in a certain way
But there has been no space-based, global-scale mission to directly measure the direction of the wind.
This information should prove
extremely valuable, as it will allow for much improved weather prediction, especially in areas like the tropics where there are fewer
stations and weather balloons (yes, they use them) from which to collect data
As such, the Aeolus mission may help understand and predict the genesis and paths of tropical storms, giving people more timely and accurate
warnings.
Weather in areas rich in balloons should also be improved by a few percent of accuracy — which doesn''t sound like a lot, but
really is, especially for aerospace businesses, farmers and others whose livelihood revolves around the weather.
Ironically (though not
particularly worryingly), Aeolus first intended launch date was scrubbed because of high winds
If only there were a satellite that could have helped predict that.
Aeolus orbit is a slightly unusual one called a sun-synchronous
It will hover at 320 kilometers above the terminator, the line demarcating night from day, while circling around the poles every 90 minutes
So it zipping in the north-south axis at great speed, and takes a week to sample the whole globe.
Data is fired off to a station in
Svalbard, Norway once every orbit, and the plan right now is to distribute that data within three hours to the meteorological authorities
who will be using it for their own purposes.
The mission is only planned to last three years, since it more of a technology demonstration
than a full-scale semi-permanent satellite
If Aeolus proves as useful as it promises to be, another satellite or perhaps several may be launched with improvements and perhaps other
instruments.
The satellite has been in French Guiana since July and has been loaded up atop a Vega rocket since earlier this month
Live coverage should begin at 23:00 CEST, 14:00 (2:00 PM) Pacific time, and liftoff is planned for 20 minutes after that
It should take almost an hour for the full deployment process to take place, so we&ll know shortly afterwards if all went well.
