2010 July 2

After the successful launching on November 2nd, the SMOS operations, the mission of the European Space Agency aimed at improving the understanding of the water cycle in our planet through global observations of the levels of soil moisture and ocean salinity, are already at their nominal stage.

The equipments for the operation of the mission are located in France and Spain, at the European Space Astronomy Center, at Villafranca del Castillo, where the Operations and Data Processing Center is located. The staff of this center is made up by the operations personnel from the Agency and professionals from INSA.
The operations’ team successfully completed the Launch and Early Orbit Phase (LEOP) and the satellite delivered the first calibrated images at the end of February.

The person in charge of the mission and the SMOS systems for ESA, Hubert Barré, defined the operations Spanish team as “motivated, focused and perfectly integrated- a fundamental value to the success of the SMOS mission in orbit”.