SSTL & DMCii are scheduled to be featured on the Discovery Channel’s "How Do They Do It?" television programme. Tune in to either Discovery Channel or Discovery HD at 20:00 on Thursday 27th August (Updated).

If you are not one of the 1.2 billion who already watch the program, "How Do They Do It?" showcases a wide variety of technology and inventions from around the world from the cutting-edge to the well established, telling the story behind the technology and essentially explaining how things work.

The SSTL/DMCii section is entitled “How do they make the satellites that provide pixel perfect pictures of the earth from deep space?”, which seems partucularly timely, considering the SSTL built UK-DMC2 and Deimos-1 satellites have just been launched and are supplying their first satellite images to DMCii as this blog is published.

For those readers outside the UK, the program will be followed by a US version on the Science Channel in early September. Space Blog will keep readers up to date nearer the time, with details where possible.

SSTL is currently a hive of activity as the two new DMC constellation satellites UK-DMC2 and Deimos-1 are prepared for launch on 25th July.

The Earth observation missions, UK-DMC2 and Deimos-1, will be launched onboard a Dnepr rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Saturday, 25th July 2009 at 18:46 UTC, 19:46 BST.

The spacecraft, which are both based on the 100kg class SSTL-100 micro satellite platform, will join the international Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC), expanding the constellation to six operational satellites. The new satellites will enhance DMC satellite daily imaging capacity for applications such as deforestation mapping, urban planning, natural resource management, security, agriculture and disaster relief operations.

To find out more about the UK-DMC2 satellite, earth observation applications that it will participate in and its role in international disaster relief efforts visit the UK-DMC2 pages on the SSTL website.

Continue reading "UK-DMC2 and Deimos-1 launch buzz"

SSTL will present new small satellite “eye in the sky” solutions for civilian and security applications at the IDEX International Defence Exhibition and Conference in Abu Dhabi 22-26th February 2009.

“Eye in the sky” capability provides valuable security and environmental benefits to national and regional authorities, but this often comes at a high cost that restricts access to a privileged few. SSTL’s next generation satellite system is able to respond rapidly to tasks, imaging objects of less than 1m in size and provide frequently updated images for applications in surveillance, agriculture, or land use change mapping.

Head of International Business, Steve Young commented,

“SSTL can now provide a satellite system that can image the entire land area of the Earth within 30 months, at a resolution better than 1m, for less than $50M. This makes space much more accessible to regional and government programs seeking more independent native capabilities.”

Such new systems form part of SSTL’s space-based security solutions for national and regional security. The integrated solutions offered at IDEX 2009 enable real-time early warning and a reduction in time scales from threat-detection to termination in the field.

Young added,

“As the world’s most experienced team of small satellite engineers we address the top level requirements for space-based solutions. We design, build and launch cost effective satellite missions - and then we take it a step further by training local engineers and technical staff so that our customers can develop their own independent space capability.”

SSTL has more than 20 year’s experience designing and operating civilian and commercial earth observation missions. One such example is the CHRIS satellite imager which is flown onboard ESA’s PROBA mission. The imager has been providing hyperspectral data to the scientific community for the last 7 years, supporting resource management, deforestation and forest husbandry, precision farming, aerosol monitoring and water quality assessment.

Following the success of CHRIS, SSTL has developed the new CHRIS-2 imager which will provide vital data for mineralogists and ecologists alike, defining spectra for mineral exploration, information currently provided by aircraft reconnaissance and on-the-ground surveys.

The Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC) and the recently launched RapidEye constellation demonstrate SSTL’s ability to provide systems equivalent to LandSat and other wide area imaging systems at a fraction of the cost of conventional large satellites.
SSTL-built satellite, TopSat, is providing 2.5m imagery of the Earth, having successfully achieved its original mission objective as a technology demonstrator for the UK Ministry of Defence.

Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd is exhibiting at IDEX 2009 Hall 06 stand A25, so why not drop by?