Group for Earth Observation

No 58 - June 2018

First Light for Sentinel 3B

The Copernicus Sentinel-3B satellite, launched from Russia’s Plesetsk Cosmodrome on April 25, 2018, recorded
this cloudless 300 metre resolution view of Northern Europe on May 8 using its 21-band Ocean and Land Colour
Instrument (OLCI). Various types of ground cover can be seen, as well as snow on the highlands of Norway and aphytoplankton bloom in the North Sea.
Image: Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), edited by EUMETSAT, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Francis BellGEO has enjoyed the privilege of visiting
EUMETSAT’s Head Quarters in Darmstadt
on a four yearly cycle, the last visit being in
2015. Each visit has been judged successful
from both a technical information and apersonal social perspective.
It has been suggested by a number of GEO
members that it would be great to have aDarmstadt visit in 2019 which fits exactlywith our four yearly cycle of visits.
In addition to visiting EUMETSAT’s HQ,
previous visits have included excursions toEuropean Space Operations Centre (ESOC),
again in Darmstadt, plus a visit to the
EUMETSAT ground station communication
unit at Usingen, just north of Frankfurt.

This GEO group photograph was taken outside EUMETSAT’s HQ building in 2011.

To be sure that it’s worthwhile trying toorganise a GEO visit to Darmstadt in 2019,
I need to know if there is sufficient support
by our members for such a visit. I would only
be confident in trying to organise a visit if
there were, say, 20 plus members attending.
Personally I’m keen to visit and learn asmuch as possible about the EUMETCast
High Volume Service plus other current
developments.
If you are interested in visiting Darmstadt in
2019, please email me so that I can place
your name on a provisional list. There will
be no commitment by registering your namebut it will give me an idea of the scale ofour members interest. There will no specificcharge for the visit but participants will haveto be responsible for their own transport andaccommodation costs.
Please note that no arrangement has yet
been made with EUMETSAT, and a planned
visit may be dependent on many factors
relating to those organisations we wish tovisit. However a starting point would be thedates of June 27-28, 2019. These dates
correspond with the late June dates of ourprevious visits. Please let me know if you
wish to be placed on a provisional list of
GEO visitors and I will keep you in touchwith potential arrangements.
Email me please, to:francis@geo-web.org.uk

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Outside the EUMETSAT HQ building

EUMETSAT’s media archive centre

GEO visitors in the central control room of
EUMETSAT’s satellite systems

GEO members in the presentation room at
EUMETSAT’s ground station

www.geo-web.org.uk

Some of the medium sized dishes at Usingen ground station

The GEO party enjoyed an informal dinner here, together withEUMETSAT staff, in the evening after a busy technical day.

GEO MANAGEMENT TEAM
Director and Public Relations
Francis Bell,
Coturnix House, Rake Lane,
Milford, Godalming, Surrey GU8
5AB,
England.
Tel: 01483 416 897
email: francis@geo-web.org.uk
General Information
John Tellick,email: information@geo-web.org.uk

Les HamiltonIt was particularly encouraging to receive an article for the
GEO Newsletter from David Sale, recounting his experienceswith both Meteor LRPT and NOAA APT reception in Australia.
Though his article is by no means an in-depth tutorial
on satellite reception, David certainly raises awareness oftechniques and useful software, particularly on the Linux
operating system, that readers might enjoy trying out.

GEO Newsletter Editor
Les Hamilton,
8 Deeside Place,
Aberdeen AB15 7PW, Scotland UK.
email: geoeditor@geo-web.org.uk

s ever, we are always pleased to receive contributions fromreaders, be they articles or just interesting satellite images.
These should continue to be sent to the Editor at

Technical Consultant (Hardware)David Simmons
email: tech@geo-web.org.uk

Contents

Webmaster and Website Matters
Alan Banks,e-mail: webmaster@geo-web.org.uk
GEO Shop Manager
Nigel Evans(Assistant: David Simmons),
email: shop@geo-web.org.uk
Management TeamRob Denton
David Anderson
Clive Finnis
Carol FinnisPeter GreenA

geoeditor@geo-web.org.uk

GEO Report
Quarterly Question
Meteor M2 News
Mount Mayon
Netherlands’ Ice
Going for Atmospheric GoldGEO Visits Kempton Rally
Cloud Streets and Ice in the Barents Sea
Shipping responds to Arctic Ice Decline
Space Storm Hunter installed on ISS
Experiences with Meteor MN2 and NOAA
Twenty Years of NOAA 15 Reception
Winter in Northern Scandinavia
Current Satellite Data

Francis Bell
Francis BellLes Hamilton
European Space Agency
European Space Agency
NASA Earth Observatory
Francis Bell
NASA Earth Observatory
NASA Earth Observatory
European Space Agency
David SaleFrancis Bell
MODIS Web

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Francis Bell
Question 57
My thanks to those members who contacted me withthe answers to the previous Quarterly Question, which
related to a recent satellite image of an erupting volcano
in the Philippines. I asked for the name of the volcano
and its association with any ring. The volcano is called‘Mayon Volcano’ and it is associated with—or part of—the ‘Pacific Ring of Fire’,the ring of volcanoes whichsurround the Pacific Ocean. (more about Mayon on p 5)
Question 58
This new Quarterly Question is perhaps more politicalthan geological. During my travels around the world I
have occasionally visited an island which is divided bypolitical boundaries, that is, the island is part of morethan one nation. I have personally visited at least six
such islands but I know there are others.
The question is: “Name as many islands as you
can which are divided into—or are part of—different
countries”. List the islands and the countries concerned.
To start your researches examine Figures 1 and 2, which
are satellite images of islands that are divided politicallybetween different countries. Figure 1 is an island locatedin the Mediterranean Sea. It is approximately 140 miles
long from east to west. Figure 2 is a colour composite
image of a European island, measuring approximately

Figure 1
Image © ESA

310 miles from northeast to southwest, with its western
coast facing the Atlantic Ocean
Please send the names of these islands, plus a list ofother islands and the countries between which they are
divided, tofrancis@geo-web.org.uk.
If you can do this by the end of August 2018 you will
have appropriate recognition in the September issue of
the GEO Newsletter: but a response at any time will bewelcome and acknowledged.
I’m not sure how many islands qualify for inclusion inan answer, I suspect about ten, however I await youranswers.

Meteor M2 NewsLes Hamilton
In early May this year, Russia’s Meteor M2
satellite started to exhibit signs of attitude control
problems, firstly with partial images appearing on
its LRPT stream on 137.9 MHz, before imaging
ceased altogether between May 6 and 7, fuelling
speculation that the satellite had suffered a fatal
malfunction.
However, LRPT images started to reappear on
May 8 and have done so consistently throughout
the remainder of the month. Interestingly, though,the Meteor LRPT has since been transmitting
channels 1, 2 and 3 (the visible and near infrared
frequencies), allowing enthusiasts an extended
opportunity to enjoy more realistic colour images.
It was suggested that the channel 4 infrared
sensor might have been damaged during theperiod of attitude loss, but Rob Alblas confirmedthat it was still being disseminated on the HRPT
transmissions.
The image opposite shows Scotland, including the Western
Isles, Orkney and Shetland, in RGB123 rendition from
Meteor M2, as acquired at 10.19 UT on May 28, 2018.

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Figure 2
Image © ESA

www.geo-web.org.uk

Mount Mayon, Philippines
European Space Agency

ESA’s Sentinel 1B satellite captured this radar image of Philippines’ Mount Mayon on January 16, 2018.
Copyright contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), processed by ESA, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

The Copernicus Sentinel-1B satellite takes us over one of
the most active volcanos in the world: Mount Mayon on theisland of Luzon in the Philippines. [It should be noted that
the January eruption of Mount Mayon was the subject of
our Newsletter’s Quarterly Question 57 - Ed].

extinct. Dubbed a perfect volcano because of its symmetry,
Mount Mayon has a classical conical shape, built up by
many layers of hardened lava. It erupts frequently with themost recent eruption occurring in January this year.

Luzon is the biggest island in the Philippines and home tomost of the country’s active volcanoes. This volcanism is
associated with plate tectonic processes where the floor of
the South China Sea is being drawn down into the mantle
along the Manila Trench, located to the west of the island.
The image just shows part of the southern end of this large
island, but features no less than five volcanoes.

This image was captured on January 16, 2018, and whilesatellite radar isn’t typically used to detect hot lava flows,
the way it has been processed reveals a pink line running
down the southeast flank of the volcano that matches
the flow of lava in optical images from satellites such as
Sentinel-2. The predominant bright green in the image
corresponds to vegetation, the lighter green and pink totowns and the blue to cultivated fields.

While Mount Mayon—the most southerly volcano in theimage—is famous not only for being perfectly formed,
but also for being one of the most active in the world, theother volcanoes in the image are actually either dormant orWhile the Sentinel-1 radar mission is used for a myriadof everyday applications, it is also used to detect groundmovement, which is essential for monitoring shifts fromearthquakes and volcanic uplift.

www.geo-web.org.uk

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Netherlands Ice
European Space Agency

This Copernicus Sentinel-2 image from March 2,
2018 shows Amsterdam, and the IJmeer andMarkermeer freshwater lakes, covered by a thinlayer of ice. As famous as the Netherlands isfor flowers, it’s arguably equally renowned forice skating. While the cold snap caused havoc
throughout much of Europe, the Dutch were busy
dusting off their skates and eager to hit the ice.
The ice on these big lakes was much too thin toskate on, but some canals in Amsterdam wereclosed to boats to give the ice a chance to thicken
and skaters took what is now a relatively rareopportunity to enjoy a national pastime.
A possible consequence of climate change, theNetherlands doesn’t see the ice that it used to.
The Royal Netherlands Meteorological Instituterates winters using an index: those scoring above
100 are considered cold. Between 1901 and 1980,
there were seven winters above 200—very cold.
The last time the index exceeded the magical
100 mark was in 1997. In fact, this was also thelast time the weather was cold enough for the‘Elfstedentocht’: a 200 km skating race between 11
towns in the north of the country. In 2014, for the
first time since measurements began, the index fellto zero.
While people enjoyed the ice below, this Sentinel-2
image, which is also featured on the Earth fromSpace video programme, allows us to view the
beauty of this short-lived layer of ice from above.
http://www.esa.int/spaceinvideos/Videos/
2018/03/Earth_from_Space_Netherlands_ice

Copyright: image contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), processed by ESA
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 IGO (CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO) licence

The koudegetal (cold number), also referred to as the Hellmann number (H) after the German meteorologist Gustav
Hellmann, is a measure of the cold during the five month interval between November 1 and the subsequent March 31.
It is obtained by adding together all 24-hour average temperatures that are below freezing during this period, withomission of the minus sign. The coldest winter on record was 1947 (featured in the March Newsletter), which had akoudegetal of 348, closely followed by the severe winter of 1963 (337).

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www.geo-web.org.uk

This is the complete scene imaged by Sentinel-2A on March 2, showing ice stretching from the Afsluitijk
in the north through IJsselmeer and Merkermeer to the IJ near Amsterdam.
Image: Modified Copernicus data © ESA / Sentinel (2018)www.geo-web.org.uk

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Going for Atmospheric GOLD
NASA Earth Observatory
In late January 2018, NASA’s Global-scale Observationsof the Limb and Disk (GOLD) instrument was launched
into space aboard a commercial satellite. GOLD is novelin two ways: it marks the first time that a NASA science
mission is flying an instrument as a commercially hosted
payload, and it is the first time scientists will monitor
the daily and hourly weather of the uppermost parts ofEarth’s atmosphere where it meets the edge of space.
The instrument was launched on January 25 on an
Ariane‑5 rocket attached to SES-14, a communication
satellite. On January 28, GOLD was briefly powered on
to make sure it was working, then shut back down for thetransit to orbit. The mission is being led by the Universityof Central Florida.

Astronaut photograph ISS054-E-5626 was acquired on December 25,
2017, with a Nikon D4 digital camera using a 600 millimeter lens, andis provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations Facility and the Earth
Science and Remote Sensing Unit, Johnson Space Center.

Space is teeming with fast-moving, charged particles andwith electric and magnetic fields that guide their motion.
At the boundary between Earth’s atmosphere andspace, the charged particles of the ionosphere coexist
with the upper reaches of the neutral atmosphere, orthermosphere. The two commingle and influence one
another constantly. This interplay is the focus of theGOLD mission.
“The upper atmosphere is far more variable thanpreviously imagined, but we don’t understand theinteractions between all the factors involved,” stated
Richard Eastes, mission principal investigator at the
University of Colorado. “That’s where GOLD comes in:
For the first time, the mission gives us the big picture of
how different drivers meet and influence each other.”
Historically difficult to observe, this little understoodregion responds both to terrestrial weather in the lower
atmosphere and the tumult of space weather above. It
responds rapidly, too, undergoing dramatic change in as
little as an hour.
Big events in the lower atmosphere, such as hurricanes
and tsunamis, create waves that can travel all the way
up to this interface to space, changing wind patterns
and causing disruptions. From the space side, flurries ofenergised particles and solar storms carry electric andmagnetic fields and have the potential to disrupt Earth’s
space environment. This combination of factors makes it
difficult to predict changes in the ionosphere.
“Space isn’t just the home of astronauts and satellites;
it affects our day-to-day lives,” said Sarah Jones,
GOLD mission scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space
Flight Center. Low-Earth orbiting satellites and theInternational Space Station fly through the ionosphere.
Communication signals, radio waves, and GPS signals
also travel through this region. Sudden changes in theionosphere can disrupt these space-based activities.
GOLD seeks to understand what drives change in thiscritical region. The resulting data will improve forecasting

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The GOLD satellite
Image: NASAmodels of the space weather events. This is the firstmission that can provide observations fast enough tomonitor in detail the hour-by-hour changes of space
weather.
Roughly the size of a mini fridge, the 36 kg GOLD
instrument is an imaging spectrograph that specificallymeasures far ultraviolet light, creating full-disk ultraviolet
images of Earth from geostationary orbit above theWestern Hemisphere. GOLD will collect observations
with a 30-minute cadence, much higher than any missionthat has come before it.
From these images, scientists can determine thetemperature and relative amounts of different particles—
such as atomic oxygen and molecular nitrogen—present
in the neutral atmosphere, which is useful for determining
how these neutral gases shape ionospheric conditions.
These data will provide the first maps of the upper
atmosphere’s changing temperature and composition allover the Americas.
You can learn more about GOLD in this YouTube video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXiaN85Ck4M

www.geo-web.org.uk

Story by Lina Tran, NASA GSFC

Francis BellGEO has attended the Kempton
Amateur Radio and Computer Rally
for many years in the past with
our display stand, demonstrationsand verbal advice: this year was no
exception for our April visit. The rally
is always busy with members of thegeneral public, some of whom know
GEO but the majority learning about
our hobby for the first time when
visiting our stand with its displays.
In the past we have run live
EUMETCast reception at this rally
and it has always proved attractive
to visitors. However, nowadays thereception requirement of a larger
dish and very accurate alignmentis too demanding for us to set
everything up in the short time scale
before the beginning of a rally. Asan alternative, therefore, we show
visitors the near equivalent by using
recorded images, generally only
about one day old. This is now ourrally display policy for EUMETCast
imagery. Our live demonstrations
on the stand using a SDR dongle
for local radio reception proved
interesting to visitors.
In addition to EUMETCast images we
had available for display many other
Earth images, some of them recorded
via live home reception and others
gathered from ESA, NOAA, NASA orother sources. In addition to viewing
images we also carried on our stand
GEO literature and interestingpromotional materials fromEUMETSAT plus their handouts,
together with the potential sales of
our SDR dongles.

All set up and raring to go! David Simmons (left) and Robert Coombes
ready with our stand just a few moments before opening to the public.

David Simmons and Robert Coombes chatting withvisitors to the GEO stand at the Kempton rally.

Again this was a busy rally withvisits from Amateur Radio friends
and some GEO members visiting thestand again plus interest from manymembers of the general public.
My thank to David Simmons G1MAL
and Robert Coombes for their help in
running the GEO stand.

www.geo-web.org.uk

9Cloud Streets and Ice in the Barents Sea
NASA Earth Observatory

Sea ice in the Arctic Ocean grows
each year throughout the autumn
and winter and reaches its maximum
extent some time between Februaryand April. This year, sea ice peaked
on March 17, 2018, at 14.48 million
square kilometres, the second-lowest
maximum on record. There was stillenough ice, however, to cool the airand help produce cloud streets—long,parallel bands of cumulus clouds that
commonly form this time of year whencold air blows over warmer water.
On March 15, 2018, two days before
sea ice reached its maximum extent,
the Moderate Resolution Imaging
Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s
Aqua satellite acquired this image ofcloud streets over the Barents Sea.
According to the National Snow andIce Data Center, this region had alate spurt of sea ice growth. When
this image was acquired, cool air was
blowing southward across the sea ice
and over the comparatively warmer
open water off northern Europe.
Ultimately, cloud streets are the visible
result of nature trying to balancedifferences in energy. Columns ofwarmed air called thermals rise throughthe atmosphere, moving heat awayfrom the sea surface. The air masses
rise until they hit a warmer air layer(temperature inversion) which acts likea ‘lid’, causing the rising thermals toroll over and loop back on themselves
forming parallel cylinders of rotating air.
On the upper side of these cylinders(rising air), clouds form. Along thedownward side (descending air), theskies are clear.
Notice, too, the variation in sea ice
across the Barents and Kara seas.
In contrast to the Barents, ice in the
Kara Sea (east of the Novaya Zemlya
archipelago) is still solid. The second
image shows a detailed view of sea
ice near Russia. Light gray areas that
resemble shadows north of Kolguyev
Island are likely to be due to sea icethat has been thinned by offshore
winds.
Caption by Kathryn Hansen.

Cloud Streets over the Barents Sea

A close-up image of the Detail highlighted in the main image

NASA Earth Observatory images by Jeff Schmaltz, using MODIS data from LANCE/EOSDIS Rapid Response.

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www.geo-web.org.uk

Ken Morgan sent in this splendid APT image of Australia,
acquired on March 31, 2018 using a tall narrow QFH antenna,a Timestep Proscan receiver and the WxtoImg program. Kenasks us to note the two rivers that seem to end nowhere. I fact

they empty into Lake Eyre, currently a dry salt lake, but whichoccasionally fills with water when rains feed these rivers. It wason Lake Eyre that Donald Campbell created a land speed recordof 403 mph in his car ‘Bluebird’ on July 17, 1964.

www.geo-web.org.uk

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Shipping Responds to Arctic Ice Decline
NASA Earth Observatory

In late March 2018, scientists fromthe National Snow and Ice Data
Center (NSIDC) and NASA reported
that Arctic sea ice had reached
its annual maximum extent. Onceagain, the ice cover was well below
average. The four smallest maxima
throughout the satellite record haveall occurred in the past four years,
continuing a decades-long trend of
shrinking ice in the Arctic Ocean andsurrounding waterways.
The annual maximum and minimum
ice extents for the Arctic region havebecome steadily smaller over the
past 40 years, and the percentageof thick, multi-year ice has been
shrinking considerably. This thinningand retreating ice has opened theArctic Ocean to new opportunities,
but also serious environmental
concerns. Shipping traffic fits into
both categories.

Figure 1 - Average concentration of Arctic sea ice on March 17, 2018

Figure 1 shows the average
concentration of Arctic sea ice on
March 17, 2018, when it reached its
annual maximum. All white-shaded
areas had an ice concentration ofat least 15 percent (the minimumat which satellites give a reliablemeasurement), and span a total
area that scientists refer to as
the ‘ice extent.’ Ice cover peaked
at 14.48 million km2, the second
lowest maximum on record and1.16 million km2 below the 1981 to2010 average. The animated line plot
(figure 2) shows Arctic sea ice extent
for every March since 1979.
The effects of declining sea ice haverippled throughout the Arctic region
and the world. Plants, animals,
plankton and people are being forced
to adapt to warmer summers andwinters, and to more open water.
Atmospheric and ocean-circulation
patterns are also changing, moving
the jet streams and stirring up
unusual weather in the high- andmid-latitudes.
The disappearing ice is alsochanging the shipping industry. In
August 2017, a newly designed

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Figure 2 - Annual trend of March sea ice in the Arctic

tanker with a hardened hull became
the first merchant ship to sail acrossthe Arctic Ocean without the aid ofan icebreaker. The Christophe deMargerie travelled from Norway toSouth Korea in nineteen days, nearlya week faster than the traditional trip
via the Mediterranean Sea and theSuez Canal.
It took just six months to top thatfeat. In February 2018, a tanker
carrying liquid natural gas (theEduard Toll) cruised through mid-www.geo-web.org.uk

winter ice cover from South Korea toSabetta terminal (northern Russia) toFrance.
The map in figure 3 (page 13) shows
unique ship visits to Arctic waters
between September 1, 2009, andDecember 31, 2016. The map was
created through a collaboration led
by Paul Arthur Berkman, directorof the science diplomacy centre at
Tufts University, and Greg Fiske, ageospatial analyst at the Woods Hole
Research Center. The team mappedFigure 3 - Plot of unique ship visits to Arctic waters between September 1, 2009, and December 31, 2016

and analysed more than 120 million data points compiledby SpaceQuest, a company that designs microsatellites
that can monitor the track Automatic Identification
System (AIS) signals from ships.

future scenario planning activities, and create geospatialmaps, building common interests with practical
governance options (without advocacy) that will promotesustainable development of the Arctic.’

Berkman, Fiske, and colleagues have found that themean centre of shipping activity moved 300 kilometres
north and east—closer to the North Pole—over the
7-year span. They were particularly surprised to findmore small ships, such as fishing boats, penetrating
farther into Arctic waters. The team also plotted the AIS
ship tracks against sea ice data from NSIDC and foundthat ships are encountering ice more often and doing so
farther north each year.

The group of researchers and policy specialists provides
objective information that can guide the placement of
infrastructure and the management of activities such as
search and rescue and pollution response.

Russia, China, Canada, the United States, and Iceland
are leading a body of nations preparing for more shipping
activity in the Arctic. The Northwest Passage throughCanada and the Northern Sea Route, or Northeast
Passage, north of Russia and Siberia are both valued
because they could significantly shorten ship transit
times between Asia, Europe, and North America. But
scientists and environmental advocates have serious
concerns about pollution, oil spills, and disturbances tomarine life, among other possible impacts. Then there is
the danger to the lives of sailors plying icy waters withpoor navigation charts.
Berkman is the coordinator and lead investigator of PanArctic Options, an interdisciplinary, international effort to‘synthesize natural and social science research, leverage

Whether open Arctic water is a boon for shipping, itremains bad news for the Arctic environment as wehave known it. ‘Arctic sea ice cover continues to be in adecreasing trend, and this is connected to the ongoingwarming of the Arctic,’ said Claire Parkinson, a climate
scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. ‘It’s a
two-way street: the warming means less ice is going toform, and more ice is going to melt. But also, because
there is less ice, less of the Sun’s radiation is reflected
off of Earth, and this contributes to the warming.’
Acknowledgements• NASA Earth Observatory images (sea ice
concentration and extent) by Joshua Stevens, using
data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
• Ship traffic map provided by Greg Fiske, Woods
Hole Research Center.
• Funding for the ship traffic analyses is provided
by the National Science Foundation (NSF-OPP
1263819 and NSF-ICER 1660449).
• Story by Mike Carlowicz.

www.geo-web.org.uk

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Space Storm Hunter installed on ISS
European Space Agency

who are eagerly awaiting readings
from the observatory, in order
to find the best solution. Visual
cameras will pinpoint areas ofinterest while photomultipliertubes record the details of thelightning and transient luminous
events. Other sensors areincluded to learn more about
terrestrial gamma-ray flashes,and for high and low energy x-ray
and gamma-ray bursts.
Each element of the Storm
Hunter will be activated in turn,and tested to ensure it is working
as expected. This is expected
to take up to six weeks, during
which the user control centre will
be run continuously.
the ASIM mounted on the European space laboratory Columbus
Copyright ESA–D. Ducros

On April 13 this year, theAtmosphere-Space Interactions
Monitor, also known as theSpace Storm Hunter, was installedon the outside the European
space laboratory Columbus.
Operators in Canada commanded
the International Space Station’s
16 metre long robotic arm tomove the 314 kg facility from a
Dragon spacecraft’s cargo holdto its place of operation on the
Columbus module.

channels. The Storm Hunter will
send data over the International
Space Station network beamed
via communication satellites
to a ground station in White
Sands, USA; then on to theSpace Station mission control
in Houston; under the Atlantic
ocean to the Columbus Control
Centre near Munich, Germany;and finally to the Belgian user
operations and support centre in
Brussels.

Pointing straight down towards
Earth, the Storm Hunter
will observe lightning andpowerful electrical bursts inthe atmosphere that occur
above thunderstorms, theso-called transient luminous
events. The inner workingsof these magnificent forces ofnature are still unknown. The
International Space Station offersa great vantage point to gather
information about such eventsas it circles 400 kilometres above
Earth and covers the areas wheremost thunderstorms appear.

The observatory carries two
suites of instruments to capture
optical images in infrared andultraviolet, and x-ray andgamma-ray detectors. Sensors
will measure light levels todetermine if an image should betaken and the data sent back to
Earth.

The first part to getting data ischecking the communication

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Setting the levels will be amatter of trial and error: setting
the trigger too low will flood
the network with images thatare of no use; too high andsome thunderstorms will not
be recorded. The operators will
collaborate with scientists at theTechnical Institute of Denmarkwww.geo-web.org.uk

Anuschka Helderweirt, operations
engineer at the Belgian
operations centre, stated: ‘We
are thrilled to start operatingthese instruments in space,this is what the hours spent
training, developing proceduresand preparing for anomalies wasfor. We are ready to deliver somefascinating new scientific data.’

Storm hunter infographics© ESA

Experiences with Meteor MN2 & NOAA APTDavid Sale
The Past
A long, long time ago (30 years ago) in a galaxy far,
far away (Melbourne, Australia), I came across anelectronics article describing receiving weather images
directly from polar orbiting satellites, specifically the
NOAA and Meteor series. I had been receiving Wefax HF
signals and this seemed a natural progression. While I
was able to hear the satellites, my scanner only had an
inadequate 5 kHz bandwidth. A dedicated receiver thencost the equivalent of $AUD600 in today’s prices, welloutside a uni-student’s budget. And then other interests
took over.
Fast forward to now and the scene has changed
dramatically: shared data, software & information via
the Internet, the rise of software-defined-radio with alower cost, greater flexibility, and typically improved
performance compared with hardware-only receivers.
It is much easier to adjust the bandpass filter width
using a PC, mouse and software than having tophysically construct a hardware filter for each frequency
and bandwidth of interest. Similarly, for the different
modulation methods (AM, FM, SSB, xPSK, etc).
So it is this context that I came across another article
describing the use of low cost RTL based SDR for APT
reception. The software was GQRX (for receiving) andxwxtoimg (for decoding to an image). There was a delay
obtaining images until I discovered that decimation needs
to be used with gqrx to give a usable signal (improves
the signal-noise ratio), and xwxtoimg requires a 11025 Hz
sampling rate (not the fixed 48 kHz as written by gqrx).
Sox, ffmpeg or audacity could then be used to re-sample.
Once the correction was made, the image magicallyappeared.
My first antenna was a discone.
This was at a low height, linearlypolarised and gave mediocre
quality (poor signal strength, anddeep fades at higher elevations),
but did give the occasional usefulimage.

At this stage, APT reception was reasonably good. The
next step was to try the Meteor MN2 LRPT signal. The
main differences from APT are that the signal is digitalrather than analogue and uses a wider bandwidth of
120 kHz vs 30 kHz (more noise). The end result is thatthe signal quality is more critical.
My first attempts using the QFH, RTL SDR, meteor_
qpsk_rx_rtl.py, and LRITofflineDecoder.exe (+ WINE for Linux)
weren’t successful. As a last resort, I used a hand-held
4 element 2-metre yagi beam antenna and manually
tracked the satellite. This worked well. The satellite wasbroadcasting in the 123 spectral mode (visible and nearIR frequencies) which gave a visually appealing image.
It has subsequently proved possible to receive images
using the QFH. However, the elevation needs to exceed
25 degrees to have any chance of decoding a meaningful
image. The advantage of the QFH is unattended
reception.
The Present
There are some ongoing issues with Meteor MN2 image
reception. The first is the 6 minute reset which appears
to be an issue with the onboard JPEG compression usedfor LRPT. This is unavoidable. Consequently, the failureof the Meteor MN2-1 launch on 30/11/17 was a huge
disappointment as it was hoped that this issue would becorrected in the new satellite. Hopefully, the next satellite(MN2-2) will be successfully launched later this year.
A second issue is periodic interference from NOAA 18 on
137.9125 MHz when the satellites are in close proximity.
This occurs for a couple of days every few weeks andprevents acquiring any image data using the QFH,
although the directional yagi can usually receive a partial
image.
There is also some localised ‘burst-mode’ datatransmission that interferes with my signal reception. The
frequency range extends from 137.85 to 137.95 MHz,and the origin is somewhere south of my location. It lasts
around 0.25 second and repeats from every few seconds
to every few minutes. It manifests itself as black lines inboth APT and LRPT images. It can’t be avoided but theeffects are reduced by using the yagi (directional) and at
higher elevations (stronger signal).

A Lindenblad antenna wasconstructed specifically for the
VHF weather satellites. It isconsidered easy to constructand moderately tolerant of
measurement ‘inaccuracies’. It
did give an improved signal but
exhibited partial fading every 12
degrees or so of elevation.
Later, a QFH (quadrifilar helical)
antenna was constructed using
RG-6 coax, and this provided amore consistent coverage (figure 1). It soon replaced the
Lindenblad.

Figure 1
The author’s prototype
QFH with 2 ferrite coresInterference can also be emitted from LCD monitors (turnthe monitor off for a few seconds to see the differencein the waterfall display) and laptop switch mode
power supplies (run the laptop on batteries to see thedifference). Obviously, turning the monitor off will improve
the signal but won’t be suitable for attended monitoring.

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15

Using a different monitor (if there is a spare) and a USB
extension lead (to distance the SDR receiver away fromthe laptop) can help.
Signal strength is particularly important for the LRPT
signal. Adjacent trees do attenuate the VHF to somedegree. The QFH is around 5 metres above groundand has a clear line-of-sight for the most of the satellite
path. The hand-held yagi doesn’t, but the higher gain
compensates as well as choosing the best position forthe satellite track.
There are also occasional issues with the data stream
decoded using meteor_qpsk_rx_rtl.py. This decodes the SDR
signal directly to a digital bitstream. However, sometimes
the program fails to generate valid data, even with astrong signal. Fortunately, the meteor_qpsk_rx_rtl.py program
also records the raw data in a wave file. Using LrptRx.exe
on the wave file may give usable data (note that LrptRx.exe
requires wave files using 16 bit samples).

Figure 2 - GQRX showing the burst-mode interfering signal

The LRPTofflineDecoder software is a great program as it
displays the image and constellation diagram graphically.
However, it runs slowly, and even slower using
WINE (Windows emulation for Linux). The alternative
medet program runs natively and considerably faster(10 minutes vs 30 minutes) but only provides a console
status, and doesn’t process the ‘raw’ data from the LrptRx
program (only the .s files from meteor_qpsk_rx_rtl.py).
Software Summary and Sources
Gqrx

SDR GUI program used to record FM APT
data to a 48kHz WAVE file
http://gqrx.dk

xwxtoimg

Decodes and displays APT image datafrom an 11 kHz WAVE filehttps://pkgs.org/download/xwxapt

meteor_qpsk_rx_rtl.py

Captures the Meteor signals as an 8-bit
raw (.wav) and bitstream (.s) files. Alsoshows the signal constellation and FFTgraphs.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/8kc89wriludrrb8/
meteor_qpsk_rx_rtl.zip

medet

Command line program to convert the
bitstream to an image (.bmp) file.
https://github.com/artlav/meteor_decoder

LrptRx.exe

Converts 16 bit raw data to bitstream data(requires WINE for Linux)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qq1fjyitpa3j14o/
software.zip

LRPTofflineDecoder.exe

Converts bitstream data to an image(requires WINE for Linux)
www.radioscanner.ru/files/download/file17709/
lrptofflinedecoder_2014.09.22.0010.zip

LrptImageProcessor.exe

Corrects the Earth’s curvature in theimage. Also provides a variety of images
based upon the different spectral bands(requires WINE for Linux)
http://satsignal.eu/software/LRPT-processor.html

Gpredict

Satellite tracking & prediction program
https://github.com/csete/gpredict

sox
ffmpegaudacity

Utility programs that convert sample rates
and sample size

Figure 3
Screenshot of Gpredict with NOAA15, NOAA18 and Meteor MN2

The Images
The following represent some of the more interesting
images received over the last nine months.
Figures 4 and 5 make a comparison between NOAA 18

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www.geo-web.org.uk

Figure 4 - A NOAA18 coloured IR image

(coloured IR) and a section of a Meteor MN2 image
received one hour apart. They highlight the difference
in resolution and viewing angle. In the lower quarter of
the NOAA18 image are some fine black lines from the‘burst-mode’ interference source. (The MN2 image wascropped to remove any dropouts.)

suitable for skiing: the ski season only lasts a couple ofmonths and, as a consequence, the cost of lift tickets
and accommodation is high. It is still a popular activity formany Australians. The image illustrates the small snow
covered area compared with the rest of Australia (forreference, Australia is twice the area of all of Europe, and
32 x the United Kingdom).
Figure 7 is a section between southern Victoria andTasmania from a Meteor M N2 image. It shows what
appear to be contrails from aircraft flying between
Melbourne and Launceston or Hobart, both on theeast coast of Tasmania. This is also a faint partial trail
between Melbourne and Devonport (in the northwest
corner of Tasmania).

Figure 5
Section of Meteor MN2 LRPT 1 hour after NOAA18 image

Since the APT image is less sensitive to signal quality,
the usable satellite pass duration is longer and the image
covers a significant portion of Australia. The converse
applies to the LRPT but the resolution is higher.
The second image (figure 6) is a section of the southeast coast of Australia, stretching from Melbourne tonorth of Sydney. Of interest is the band of clouds parallelwith the eastern coastline. This seems to be due to thedrier land breeze meeting the moist air over the sea. Thisturbulent interaction presumably increases condensationand hence cloud formation as the moist air is pushed
upwards and cools.

Figure 7
A Meteor MN2 LRPT image of Victoria
and Tasmania showing contrails

The distance between Melbourne and Launceston isa little over 500 km, around 40 minutes flying time.
Therefore, there must have been negligible air movementin the upper atmosphere for the contrails to persist forthis length of time.
Bushfires
Most of Australia experiences hot dry summers, andbushfires are a real danger. Part of risk mitigation iscontrolled burns. The idea is to burn sections of theforest using low intensity fires to remove the deadundergrowth during the cooler part of the year (typically
autumn and spring). These sections can be up to several
thousand hectares. Figure 8 shows two of the larger‘burn-offs’ in the south-east corner of NSW and theirsmoke plumes over the Tasman Sea (the emulated ‘124’
spectral bands give the best contrast). Figure 9 shows
the fire incidents on the NSW rural fire service website
around the same time as the satellite image (most are for‘hazard reduction’).

Figure 6
Meteor MN2 LRPT image for south-east Australia

A second point of interest are the small snowfields inthe south-east corner. Australia is a moderately warm
continent and relatively flat—the highest peak is only
2200 m. This means that there are only a few snowfields

The final image (figure 10) illustrates some of the Earthobservation data that can be obtained from the MN2images. It is a false colour image that shows the dense
forest areas in Victoria and Tasmania. Several lakes areevident with varying shades of blue (presumably due totemperature).
Also evident are ‘green lines’ towards the top of theimage that are the Murray and Murrumbidgee river

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Figure 10
Meteor MN2 LRPT ‘123’ spectral bands image
showing forests and river flood
Figure 8
MN2 ‘124’ image showing smoke plumes from ‘burn-offs’

Figure 9
NSW fire services web site showing fires at the same time
(most are hazard reductions)systems. The Murray river is 2500 km long and drains
the western side of the mountains heading west towards
Adelaide. Much of this area is flat resulting in large flood
plains when the rivers overflow.
The dominant eucalyptus species in the flood plainsis the Red River Gum. It is tolerant to flooding and dry
conditions once established, and can live over 500 years.
However, it relies on the annual floods to germinate andgrow. The construction of dams for irrigation has reduced
most of the flooding and has negatively affected the tree
population. ‘Environmental’ flows are now released tocompensate.
The future
I’m planning a number of improvement ideas, but with nospecific completion date.
• Use RSP1A: This should improve the signal quality.
Unfortunately, the supplied software is still under18

extensive development and not very usable. The
manufacturer does supply the API for the driverwhich permits writing an interface program for use
with GQRX.
• VHF Antenna tracker: use automatic antenna
tracking with a light weight yagi antenna. However,this won’t correct the reset issue or NOAA 18 or
the ‘burst-mode’ interference, and only there is only
one suitable satellite. It’s usefulness depends on
the VHF transmission frequency and correcting the
LRPT reset issue in the future MN2-2 (and MN2-3,etc) satellites.
• HRPT: this is the ultimate LEO solution as it avoids
the JPEG buffer/LRPT reset issue, NOAA18
interference, and includes all spectral bands. There
are multiple satellites available. However, it requires
a high gain L-band (1.7 GHz) tracking antenna
system. The high gain results in a narrow beamwidth making manual tracking impractical. Someanalysis has been conducted to determine a suitableantenna for a light-weight antenna rotator system.
Unfortunately, the newer LEO satellites launch by
USA and China don’t use the L-band (they use the 8
GHz X-band instead).
• GEOS LRPT: There are several L-band LRPT
geostationary satellites, and China is still periodicallylaunching new satellites. The dish won’t require
tracking, and animations can be created as the
viewpoint remains constant. The spatial resolution is
the same as for APT but lower than for MN2 (4 km2/
pixel vs 1 km2/pixel). This requires modifying a
C-band dish.
• GEOS DVB-S2 (CMACAST & Himawari Cast) is
another option using a C-band down converter,
SDR and GNU radio. Initial testing hasn’t been able
to isolate the Himawari Cast transmission on the
JCSat-2B satellite, so it remains a work-in-progress.
So there are many ideas to keep me busy. In themeantime, the process of receiving MN2 (and APT)
continues to be a rewarding activity. Here’s hoping for a
successful MN2-2 deployment some time this year.

www.geo-web.org.uk

Twenty Years of NOAA 15 Reception
Francis BellOver a period of many years I have been recording
images from the NOAA series of satellites, generally
between about noon and late afternoon. The reason forthis was domestic convenience, to satisfy my amateurinterest without any special demands of weather
forecasting or specific science projects.
Throughout this period I had noticed the overhead
passes of NOAAs 15,18 and 19 coming progressively
later in the day, almost taking them out of my rather
gentle domestic observation time frame. I recently
realised that a late afternoon satellite pass must be
matched with an early morning pass. On checking thetimes I noticed that NOAA 15 was potentially overhead
the UK at about 8.00 am BST. At this time of year, thesouth of England where I live enjoys pretty much fulldaylight at this hour, and as my favoured satellite images
are recorded using visible light wavelengths it seemed
to me to be worth trying for an early morning image.
Figure 1 was my first result. On this occasion I used aturnstile antenna just propped up at ground level on myfront lawn and a crystal controlled receiver which I had
built myself about 18 years ago.

Figure 1 - This NOAA 15 image was recorded in the morning of May 7,
2018, the hottest May Bank Holiday day in the UK for at least 40 years.

In addition to my general interest in weather satellite
reception there were two other reasons for me to try
NOAA 15 at this time. I knew that my planned reception
was within a few hours of the twentieth anniversary of
NOAA 15’s launch, so I thought that it would be greatcompliment to the satellite—as well as to the scienceand engineering behind its launch and operation—for me
to receive and circulate a twentieth anniversary image
from the satellite. Long my it continue its operation.
Congratulations NOAA!
A second reason for wanting a weather satellite imageof the UK and Europe was the UK weather forecast forthe day in question. The forecast was for a hot day andit turned out to be the hottest May Bank Holiday Monday
on record (about 40 years) for some parts of the UK,
myself included, with a maximum temperature of 28
degrees C. To have a satellite image of the weather on
this day was rewarding.

Figure 2 - This NOAA 15 pass was recorded at 07.13 UT on May 15.
Not overhead illumination but OK considering the hour it was recorded.

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Having recorded one
image I thought I would put
some effort into recording
a longer pass using myelevated Dartcom turnstile
antenna with a mast headpreamplifier which has aclear view of the sky inmost directions. Figure 2 isthe result which I received
some days later.
Further interest may be in
the image recorded fromthe recently launched
Sentinel‑3B which wascirculated by ESA recently.
Launched on April 25,
2018, the Sentinel-3B
satellite has alreadydelivered impressive firstimages from its ocean andland colour instrument, andnow the radiometer carriedon this latest Copernicus
satellite has revealed its
talents. Captured on May 9,
2018, figure 3 shows a low
pressure system over the
UK and Ireland, France,
the Bay of Biscay, Spainand part of north Africa.
Vegetation appears in red.
The Sentinel-3B satellite
was launched from Russia
to join its identical twin,
Sentinel-3A, in orbit.
This pairing of satellites
increases coverageand data delivery for
the European Union’s
Copernicus environment
programme. Both
Sentinel-3 satellites
carry the same suite of
instruments.
The Sea and Land Surface
Temperature Radiometer(SLSTR) is particularly
sophisticated, measuring
energy radiating from
Earth’s surface in nine
spectral bands, including
visible and infrared. It
also includes dedicatedchannels for measuring
fires.
This early image camefrom its optical channels.

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Figure 3 - This is a multi-channel image from Sentinel 3B taken 07.12 UTC 10 May 2018. This was one of thefirst images received from this new satellite and interestingly the area shown and the times are close to thosefor the NOAA 15 images shown in Figures 1 and 2.
Copyright contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018),
processed by EUMETSAT

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Winter in Northern Scandinavia
MODIS Web

Northern Scandinavia, imaged by NASA’s Terra satellite on March 16, 2018.
Image Credit: Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC

On March 16, 2018, the Moderate Resolution Imaging
Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard NASA’s Terrasatellite acquired a true-colour image of a winter day
across Northern Scandinavia.

created as thick glaciers slid slowly off the mountains
and scoured troughs into the rocky landscape. Norway’s
longest and deepest fjord, Sognefjord, sits in thesouthwest coast, and is 1,308 metres deep.

The rugged landscape of the region, especially along
the western edge of the peninsula, was carved byglaciers during the last ice age. The jagged inlets thatcharacterise Norway’s coast on the Norwegian Sea
are known as fjords. Many of these fjords are steep
and deep—some over 600 metres deep—and were

Norway lies on the west of the Scandinavian Peninsula
while Sweden sits in the east. The border between thetwo countries runs along the ridges of the Scandinavian
Mountains. The Gulf of Bothnia, which lies between
Sweden and Finland was covered with a layer of ice atthe time this image was acquired.

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GEO members pictured beside one of the large dishes at Usingen, used for communication with EUMETSAT’s satellites.
Photo: Francis Bellwww.geo-web.org.uk

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