SSTL is celebrating the 8th year in orbit of the high resolution CHRIS Imager, which was launched on-board the European Space Agency’s PROBA-1 mission, in October 2001.

The Compact High Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (CHRIS) is a highly versatile hyperspectral system that was developed by SSTL’s Optical Payload Group. CHRIS was one of many instruments on-board the mission, with the others including a Space Radiation Environment Monitor (SREM) and a Payload Autonomous Star Sensor (PASS).

CHRIS offers the highest spatial resolution of any hyperspectral system currently in orbit and can provide simultaneous images of the Earth in 19 wavebands. This allows for many features of the images it produces to be identified and analysed.

This high resolution imager enables ESA’s Proba-1 mission to acquire detailed images of the Earth. The result – stunning images of natural and urban phenomena.



Many more images can be seen on ESA’s website including that of the Mauna Kea Volcano, Hawaii and Tokyo.

CHRIS can be used for many applications, including precision farming, disaster monitoring, air quality assessment and seabed classification, and has proved so successful that it has paved the way for advanced sibling CHRIS-2, which allows for other valuable applications to be addressed, including mineralogy and pollution monitoring.

The CHRIS Imager is not the only family to have grown, as the ESA’s Proba-1 mission has now been joined in orbit by Proba-2, which was successfully launched yesterday.

In addition to SSTL's CHRIS hyperspectral imager, ESA's 8-year old PROBA-1 mission has been continuing to depend on a number of sub-systems provided by SSTL (incorporating contributions from Space Innovations Limited). These include the power system, communications system, AOCS sensors, the Data Handling System computer and the SGR-20 Space GPS receiver. All systems remain fully operational in the primary chain of the satellite and have served to enable the extended life imagery capture from the CHRIS and HRC payloads.

For Space Blog readers that didn't catch our blog Watch SSTL and DMCii on TV, you can watch a clip of DMCii and SSTL in the Discovery Channel program How do they do it? below.

We would encourage anyone who missed the show to take a look at the official How do they do it website.



Find out more about SSTL's unique approach to space and to learn more about DMCii's satellite imaging using the DMC constellation visit the DMCii website.

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"

All five RapidEye satellites were successfully launched this morning by Dnepr from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.

Following this morning’s launch, the spacecraft separated from the launch vehicle in slightly different orbits to allow constellation phasing and will eventually be positioned equally spaced within the same orbit about 19 minutes apart. SSTL will control the constellation throughout the two week Launch and Early Operation Phase (LEOP) in a coordinated effort between their mission control facilities in the UK and the ground station supplied to RapidEye in Brandenburg, Germany. A team of three SSTL operators and three support staff will work with the MDA and RapidEye teams in Brandenburg, with the UK team analysing data as it is received and on standby to react to any technical challenges.

Project manager Ben Stocker commented: “The simultaneous launch of five satellites is not without its challenges. Commissioning will be performed from both the RapidEye ground station in Brandenburg and the SSTL mission control centre in Guildford. The five satellites will gradually disperse from each other following separation from the launch vehicle, allowing three satellites to be tracked and operated from Brandenburg with the remainder under the control of the Guildford operators. This method of operation offers the most efficient route to achieving the maximum amount of contact time per satellite during the early days of commissioning following launch. As the satellites are gradually manoeuvred into position around the orbit during the commissioning phase, the Brandenburg ground station will assume full control over the constellation.”

Following separation from the launch vehicle, the spacecraft activate three GaAs solar panels, generating up to 105W in sunlight. The power system will then assume active control of the battery charge management system, enabling operators to initiate communication with the five RapidEye satellites via the S-band system. Within hours the team plan to upload programs to the on-board computers that will enable early operations and checkout to commence.

The attitude control system on each spacecraft will use magnetometers, magnetorquers, sun sensors and reaction wheels to achieve 3-axis stabilization, whilst using high accuracy attitude information from a star camera to finalise accurate nadir (towards Earth) pointing before proceeding with more advanced roll manoeuvres.

Following LEOP, the full functionality of the satellites, including the imaging payloads built by German company Jena-Optronik GmbH, will be tested by collecting imagery over a 10-week period. During this time MDA will demonstrate the performance of the constellation before RapidEye AG takes delivery of the system and commences commercial imaging operations.

RapidEye plans to operate the mission to deliver agricultural land information products and services such as crop monitoring and mapping, yield prediction and natural disaster assessment.

SSTL’s Chairman, Sir Martin Sweeting, commented: “SSTL long ago established the benefits of small satellite constellations and launched the Disaster Monitoring Constellation in 2002, paving the way for a new paradigm in remote sensing. The launch of RapidEye will fully realise the business potential of constellations.

The simultaneous build of five satellites is the largest mission so far in terms of maximising and managing production at SSTL’s Guildford facilities. Expert in-house engineering and project management teams worked closely with MDA, streamlining the design, build and test of all five satellite platforms.”