Group for Earth Observation

The Independent Amateur Quarterly Publication for
Earth Observation and Weather Satellite Enthusiasts

36
December 2012
Inside this issue . . .
Esko Petäjä has produced
an informative article on
Fire Detection andMonitoring, where heinvestigates the importantrole played by satellites.
It’s now 25 years since theMontreal Protocol was set
up to tackle the problem ofozone depletion in theatmosphere. Les Hamilton
investigates whether or
not it has proved a
success.
With MODIS L1 data now
beaming down into
readers’ EUMETCast
systems, Mike Stevens
takes a look at a popular
item of dedicated viewing
software.
For readers who like achallenge, Rob Denton isoffering some unusual
prizes for the ‘farthestwest’ APT image you sendhim.
Though Envisat is nolonger active, Francis
Breame provides aninformative overview of
his experiences while
taking part in the EnviHam programme.
... plus further articles on
Hurricane Sandy,
Wildfires in Greece,
Auroras observed by the
Suomi-NPP satellite.

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: info@geo-web.org.uk
GEO Quarterly Editor
Les Hamilton,
8 Deeside Place,
Aberdeen AB15 7PW, Scotland UK.
email: geoeditor@geo-web.org.uk
GEO Quarterly Despatch
Peter Green
Membership and Subscriptions
David Anderson,
35 Sycamore Road,
East Leake, Loughborough LE12 6PP,
England, UK.
email: members@geo-web.org.uk
Tel:01509 820 067
Fax:
01509 559 015
Technical Consultant (Hardware)David Simmons
email: tech@geo-web.org.uk
Webmaster and Website Matters
Alan Banks,e-mail: webmaster@geo-web.org.uk
Education Coordinator
David Painteremail: education@geo-web.org.uk
GEO Shop Manager
Nigel Evans (Assistant: David Simmons),
email: shop@geo-web.org.uk
International Liaison
Rob Denton,
email: international@geo-web.org.uk
Clive and Carol Finnis

Publisher
Published by The Group for Earth
Observation Limited, a company in Englandand Wales, limited by guarantee and nothaving share capital.
The Company Number is 4975597.
The registered office is Coturnix House,
Rake Lane, Milford, Godalming,
Surrey GU8 5AB, England.
Printing
Hedgerow Print,
16 Marsh Lane,
Crediton, Devon EX17 1ES.
Tel: 01363 777 595
Responsibility
Every effort is made to ensure that thetechnical and constructional articles
published in this Quarterly are correct.
However, the ultimate responsibility iswith the reader to ensure the safety of
constructions and for any interfacing withother equipment. GEO cannot accept liability
for shortcomings in any published design or
any constructions carried out by members orother third parties.
Copyright GEO © 2012
The contents of this Quarterly remain theintellectual property of the Group for Earth
Observation Limited and its contributors.
Copying of text or images, either from theprinted Quarterly or from any electronicallystored source, is forbidden without
permission from the Editor.

Les Hamilton
geoeditor@geo-web.org.uk

T

he front cover of this issue is graced by some splendid imagery from GEO Quarterly reader
Robert Moore. Robert sent in a wonderfully clear satellite image of the Falkland Islands
that so impressed me that it was a shoe-in for the front cover. Robert also submitted a beautiful
panoramic photograph of clouds to illustrate his article on page 33: it also finds a place as ourmasthead background.

T

his Quarterly completes GEO’s ninth year, and also heralds an important change. Clive andCarol Finnis have now retired after eight years managing the GEO Shop, although theyremain valuable colleagues on the Management Team. Nigel Evans is the new Shop manager,
and is responsible for the acquisition and maintenance of stock. As before, David Simmonsmans the ‘front office’, and processes all your orders. The GEO Shop is probably the single
most important aspect of GEO. Although your subscriptions pay for the high quality printing of
the GEO Quarterly magazine, they go little farther than that; it’s the profits from the GEO Shopthat pay for all the ‘extras’, such as the hefty postal charges for distributing the Quarterly, staging
Symposiums, and attending rallies.

You will notice changes to the GEO Shop advert inside our back cover. The R2FX receiver
has sold out and no more are being manufactured, while, at the time of writing, there were
only two each of the R2ZX and the Dartcom QFH remaining in stock (also the last of the line).
If you plan to order either of these, email Nigel (see panel at left) to check on availability first.
On a brighter note, Holger Eckert is currently designing a follow-up APT receiver to the R2FX/Z,
though it is not yet in production. Hopefully, we will be able to bring you news of this in the not
too distant future.

M

ay I wish you the very best for the Christmas and New Year seasons ahead, and lookforward to your contributions of images and informative articles for the next issue.
Copy Deadline for Quarterly No 37, is Sunday, February 3, 2013.

Contents
GEO Report
Blue Moon imaged by MSG-3
Aral Sea Video
Carbon Eaters of the Black Sea
Quarterly Question
Cover and Full Page Images
Night View of Hurricane Isaac
Swirls along an Ice Highway
Updating the GEO Website
Fire Detection and Monitoring
The Southern Aral Sea
Satellite Dish for a Mobile EUMETCast System
National Hamfest 2012
Autumn Colours sweep across Kamchatka
Wildfire Rages on the Greek Island of Chios
The Montreal Protocol and the Ozone HoleSea Ice Retreat in the Beaufort Sea
Summer Images from the NOAA Satellites
Hurricane Sandy at Night
APT from Canada
Creating a Continuous Composite Image
Auroras over North America
Exploring Terra Imagery with the MODIS L1 Viewer
New Polar Records Established
Challenge: ‘Farthest West’
Look down - Look up - Look out
My Envi-Ham Experiences
Shiveluch Erupts
Envisat - the Lost Satellite
Metop-B takes to the Skies
Superstorm Sandy Savages States
Feedback
Satellite Status
Hurricane Nadine
GEO Helplines and Internet Discussion Groups
Copy deadline for the next issue of GEO Quarterly
GEO Membership Application FormGEO Shop Catalogue and Price List

Francis Bell
Francis BellAl Jazeera/YouTube
NASA Earth Observatory
Francis Bell

2
3
3
4
5
5
NASA Earth Observatory
6
NASA Earth Observatory
7
Alan Banks
8
Esko Petäjä
9
Anders Höök and Lars-Olof Hilmertz 12
Francis Bell15
Francis Bell
15
NASA Earth Observatory
16
NASA Earth Observatory
17
Les Hamilton
18
NASA Earth Observatory
20
David Taylor
21
NASA Earth Observatory
22
Steve Craggs
24
Fred van den Bosch
25
NASA Earth Observatory
26
Mike Stevens
28
Les Hamilton
30
Rob Denton
33
Robert Moore
33
Francis Breame
35
NASA Earth Observatory
38
Mike Stevens
39
Les Hamilton
40
Les Hamilton
42
Readers Letters
44
44
Francis Bell / Les Hamilton
45
46
46
47
48

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Francis Bell
Recent Launches
My first comment must be to offer congratulations on behalfof all the GEO membership to EUMETSAT and ESA for the
successful launch of MSG-3. I watched the launch live on
TV and it was impressive. I would also like to congratulate
EUMETSAT for the successful launch and the current
commissioning phase of their latest satellite Metop-B.
Unfortunately I was abroad on holiday for the launch date, so
I did not see it live on TV as I had for the launch of MSG-3,
but my understanding is that the launch was perfect and thesatellite is now safely in its planned sun-synchronous polar
orbit. Congratulation to all concerned. I will not dwell on this
topic because Metop-B is covered on page 40: neverthelessI still offer congratulation for the successful launch of thissatellite from which I hope to receive images for many years
to come.

On the subject of the website, our thanks andcongratulations to Alan Banks, who has done an outstanding
job in overhauling it and giving it a professional appearance.
In almost every report I write, I express disappointment about
the number of members who do not renew their membershipwith us. We have almost no feedback about why this shouldbe. Over nine years, only a handful of members have given
quite understandable and valid reasons for not renewing; inthe vast majority of cases, members just disappear without
saying why. I judge this is just by default, not taking theactive step to renew when the time comes. In order to address
this issue, we are investigating alternative subscription
payment methods, including offering an automatic renewal
if chosen by the member. I hope these changes can be
implemented sooner rather than later.

The launch of MSG-3
Image:EUMETSATGEO Activities
As usual, GEO has been very active over the past threemonths. We visited the National HamFest in Newark (seepage 15) as well as other local events, and one of ourmanagement team visited the International Meteorological
Conference in Brussels . We continue to have a close
relationship with our Werkgroep Kunstmanen friends in
the Netherlands and two of our members attended theirSeptember meeting in Utrecht. Unfortunately, personal priorcommitments prevented me from attending.
Our programme of visits and meetings for 2013 is still in
the planning phase but there are a number of ideas being
progressed. Following our successful visit to Surrey Satellite
Technology Ltd., we are hoping to visit the UK’s largest
satellite manufacturer, Astrium in Portsmouth, as well as
the National Oceanographic Centre, coincidently also locatedin Portsmouth. Approaches to these organisations havealready been made and we await their replies with interest.
A symposium in 2013 based at Bletchly Park is also being
progressed. Our pattern of attending selected radio rallies
and similar events has been confirmed as our policy for 2013,
and I hope events at Kempton, Newbury and the National
HamFest in Newark will have a GEO presence, and perhaps
others as appropriate.
Please follow our web site, where the latest news of dates forthese and other events will be posted.
http://www.geo-web.org.uk/

2This is the first SEVIRI image transmitted by
MSG-3, at 09:45 UT on August 7, 2012

Educational Support
The UK Space Agency (UKSA) was established last year andcurrently has offices in Swindon. They produce a quarterly
publication Space:UK which I have reviewed from time totime in previous GEO Quarterlies. The UKSA has establishedan educational department, and GEO is in contact with thisnew venture to assess any ways in which we can cooperate
or progress educational ideas. GEO has the experience of
establishing and operating low cost weather satellite receiving
stations, and with this background we may be able tosupport UKSA in schools.
Still on an educational topic, GEO has helped an educationalgroup called Space-Link to establish a portable EUMETCast
receiving station which they can use for demonstrations
during their school visits. GEO donated a DVBWorld
receiver for their new receiving station and helped with its

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observationcommissioning. I will report further on this project after thesystem has been used in a number of schools, by when its
educational value and the robustness of the system can beevaluated.
APT Turnstile Antenna
Until about a year ago, the GEO Shop was able to supply aturnstile antenna for 135 MHz circular polarised APT signals.
Unfortunately our supplier exhausted his stocks of specialist
parts so, for about a year, we have been unable to supply
this antenna. We do recognise a continuing demand for suchan antenna, but one problem faced by manufacturers is thatno-one knows how long APT will remain available. Recent
renewed contact with our supplier has had positive results,
as he has discovered a small stock of these old turnstile
antennas, which we can now make available to you via the
GEO Shop. This supplier is currently making a prototype for a
new antenna, using different components, and if this proves
successful this will also be offered to our members.

GEO Quarterly No 36

Francis Bell
Readers might be interested in this image, one of the first images
received from MSG-3 during its commissioning process. It is shown
just as received by the ground station without correction, and isunusual because it shows the moon in the background.
Of course there are many occasions when the moon can appear
in imagery from MSG and other geostationary satellites. However,these images are normally rectified to correct the view of Earth as
seen from the satellite to a consistent perspective, then cropped
prior to retransmission to user communities. This is necessary
because gravitational influences from the Moon and sun resultin slight deviations of the satellite from its nominal position. The
rectification process tends to remove any image of the moon which
may be in the background.

Here is a bit of personal heresy, certain to be controversial.
I don’t think a QFH antenna can out-perform a turnstile
antenna for signal reception. A turnstile antenna will receive
a signal from horizon to horizon without any dip in strengthfrom the overhead direction. What a QFH antenna may haveis physical robustness, making it suitable for marine andother extreme conditions; but for the average domestic oramateur application give me a turnstile antenna any time.
My mobile turnstile antenna, which I have taken all over
the world, is constructed from coat hanger wire and plastic
plumbing tube. It folds up and travels in a suitcase. I couldn’t
do that with a QFH antenna.
Subscriptions
The cost of GEO membership has not changed for about five
years. During this time there have been several increases inpostage rates. Until now we have been able to offset someof these additional charges by changing our printer andlimiting print runs more closely to our membership numbers.
However, the recent substantial increase in postage rates
means we are losing money, particularly for overseas readers.
Reluctantly, we have increased membership charges as
indicated in the panel at the foot of this column. These
increases will take effect from December 1, 2012.
It is worth noting that about 80% of our membershipsubscription income is spent on printing and postage. To
keep costs down we are looking at alternative membership
structures; for example, a membership where only anelectronic copy of GEO Quarterly is available. We are also
reviewing other options.

The moon appears in this test transmission from MSG-3
Image © EUMETSAT 2012

Once every year there are two occurrences of a Full Moon in thesame calendar month. This year, it was August, when the moon
was full on both the 2nd and 31st. The second full moon of themonth is known as a ‘blue’ moon, and the August 31 event wascaptured by the recently launched MSG-3 satellite just before
it disappeared from sight behind Earth’s southern hemisphere.
The infrared image was captured by the Spinning Enhanced
Visible and Infrared Imager (SEVIRI) instrument at 11:20 UT on
August 31, 2012. The image also shows Brazil’s eastern coast
along the South Atlantic Ocean, with clouds forming over the water.

New Subscription Fees
GEO ‘s subscription fees have remained
unchanged for six years, since March 2007,
surely unique for any subscription magazine of its
quality. But rising costs of materials, and moreparticularly distribution, mean that GEO is losing
over £1000 a year in maintaining this service.
Regrettably, the only way to ensure continuity
without eventually bankrupting our organisation,is to increase the fees to a realistic level, as ofnow.
You will find the new costs for membership on theMembership Form on page 47 and the GEO Shop
page that follows it.on

Readers who have been following recent articles on the Aral
Sea and its catchment area may well be interested in an
English language YouTube video ‘Aral Sea Reborn’ available
from this URL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJnNYDK48kA

This 12 minute film, shot as recently as July 2012, includes
archive footage dating from the era before the sea started
drying out and is accompanied by eye-witness commentary.
Starting in Aral’sk, you are taken on a tour of the Aral basin,
past abandoned ships and scrubland to the waters of theNorth Aral itself.
There is also an explanation of the reasons behind the sea’s
demise and of the measures in hand to restore the Northern
Aral Sea and its fishing industry. Thoroughly recommended.

www.geo-web.org.uk

3

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

The swirling cyan patterning across thesurface of the Black Sea in this MODIS
image, captured by NASA’s Aqua satellite
on July 15 this year, is a bloom of
microscopic phytoplankton. The multitudeof single-celled algae in this bloom aremost likely coccolithophores, one ofEarth’s champions of carbon pumping.
Coccolithophores constantly remove carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere and slowly
send it down to the sea floor, an actionthat helps to stabilise the planet’s climate.
Ocean scientist Norman Kuring of NASA’s

4

Goddard Space Flight Center suggested
that the bloom was likely to be Emiliania
huxleyi, though it is impossible to know thespecies for sure without direct sampling of
the water.
Coccolithophores use carbon, calcium, andoxygen to produce tiny plates of calcium
carbonate (coccoliths). Often termed‘stones’ by researchers, coccoliths resemble
tiny hubcaps. During their lifespan,coccolithophores remove carbon fromthe air, and chemically ‘fix’ it into what iswww.geo-web.org.uk

effectively a form of limestone. When theydie, they take it with them as they sink tothe sea floor.
These coccoliths are thought to speed
up the ocean’s biological pump because,
without their dense calcium carbonate
shells to help them sink, less carbon dioxide
would be drawn down into the depths of theoceans.

NASA image courtesy Norman Kuring, Ocean Color Web

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Cover and Full Page Images
Front CoverFrancis BellMy thanks to those members who took an interest in Quarterly
Question 35. The question asked for the mass of MSG-3 at thetime of launch. The answer of 2031 kg was given on EUMETSAT’s
web site and was personally confirmed to me by EUMETSAT
Operations. Just four resourceful GEO members provided a correct
answer and, although some of the finest detail did vary, they weregenerally correct.
Correct answers were received from Elmar Bogels (TheNetherlands), Frank Skillington (UK), Andreas Lubnow (Germany)
and Adrian Chamberlain (UK). Elmar Bogels clearly researched thequestion thoroughly and submitted the following answer:“The dry mass of MSG-3 was calculated at 1064.6 kg, but
additionally there was a propellant load of 601.5 kg of MON(mixed oxides of nitrogen) plus 365.5 kg of MMH (monomethyl
hydrazine), thus generating the quoted mass of 2031.7 kg
The tiny discrepancy when adding these together is probably
accounted for by labels removed from the satellite before launch.”Elmar visited the following site for details relating to MSG-3’s launch
details
http://blogs.esa.int/eolaunches/2012/06/22/
msg-3-gearing-up-for-launch/This splendid Metop-A image, showing Newfoundland on
September 28 this year, was sent in by Robert Moore, whoremarked: “It’s not often you get a good view of Newfoundland,
Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, especially at this time of
the year”.
Image © EUMETSAT 2012

Inside Front CoverMike Stevens spotted this Metop-A image on his EUMETCast stream
on August 23, 2012. Prominent as it tracks westwards north of thecoast of Venezuela is Hurricane Isaac.
Image © EUMETSAT 2012

Inside Back CoverAnother image of Hurricane Isaac from Mike Stevens, this timefrom Metop-A, showing the storm making landfall in the USA at
15:40 UT on August 18, 2012.
Image © EUMETSAT 2012

Back CoverThis MODIS L1 image from NASA’s Terra satellite was acquiredby Mike Stevens via EUMETCast on August 5, 2012, and showsmuch of south and central Europe basking in sunshine while
western Europe suffered one of its wettest summers ever.
Image © EUMETSAT 2012

It is interesting to note that about half the launch mass of theMSG-3 satellite consisted of propellant, and I presume this willbe true for many other satellites. Of course, this propellant isnecessary to establish the desired orbit after parting from thelaunch rocket, but also to fine-tune its orbit during the satellite’s
operational lifetime. Propellant reserves can often determine theoperational life of a satellite; all the electronics and sensors may
continue to work but, if the satellite cannot be kept in the correct
orbit or attitude, it may have no operational value. Often the lastremaining dregs of propellant are used to push the satellite into agraveyard orbit more distant from the Earth for decommissioning.
Notes on satellite propellants
Monomethylhydrazine (MMH) is a volatile hydrazine chemical withthe chemical formula CH3(NH)NH2. It is used as a rocket propellant
in bipropellant rocket engines because it is hypergolic [1] withvarious oxidisers such as nitrogen tetroxide (N2O4) and nitric acid
(HNO3).
MMH is a hydrazine derivative used in a satellite’s orbital
manoeuvring system (OMS) and reaction control system (RCS),
such as the engines of NASA’s Space Shuttle and other large
satellites which use MMH and MON-3 (a mixture of nitrogentetroxide with approximately 3% nitric oxide). This chemical is
toxic and carcinogenic in small amounts, but it is easily stored inspace where it provides moderate performance for very low fueltank system weight. Recently the European Space Agency (ESA)
has attempted to seek new options in terms of bipropellant rocket
combinations to avoid poisonous chemicals such as this and its
relatives.

Page 14This NOAA-18 channel-4 infrared image was acquired at 04:03 UT
in the early hours of October 27, 2012, when Winter’s first icy
blast descended from the Arctic over Great Britain. Eastern
Scotland in particular awoke to a winter wonderland, which
rapidly melted as temperatures rose following late-morning
sunshine.
Image: Space Monitoring Information Support (SMIS)
http://smisdata.iki.rssi.ru/data/noaa/html/cat_tlm.shtml?lang=english

Page 23
The Drake Passage between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans
is one of the stormiest places on Earth. At this latitude, there isabsolutely no land mass to dull the intensity of the circumpolarwinds and currents that girdle Antarctica. This Metop-A image
acquired at 13:05 UT on October 27, 2012 illustrates a typicalstormy day in the Passage. Part of Argentina, and Tierra delFuego, are prominent at the top of the image and the Antarctic
Peninsula curves like an icy scimitar at lower right. The prominent
open water west of the base of the peninsula is a bay in the
Bellinghausen Sea off Ellsworth Land, the latter named after theAmerican explorer Lincoln Ellsworth who flew over the region inlate 1935.
Image: NOAA Class Archive

1 Chemicals are termed as hypergolic if they spontaneously ignite on
contact with each other.

Quarterly Question 36
This Quarterly Question relates to the orbit of Metop-B and is quite
straightforward: ‘What is the orbital altitude of Metop-B?‘ I will accept
answers to within plus or minus one kilometre. Answers to me via
email, tofrancis@geo-web.org.uk

by Sunday, February 3, 2013. Again there will be a prize of thebook EUMETSAT 25 Years for one correct winning entry.

www.geo-web.org.uk

5

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

Early on August 29, 2012, the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer
Suite (VIIRS) flying aboard the Suomi-NPP satellite captured thisnight-time view of Hurricane Isaac and the lights of cities near
the Gulf Coast of the United States. The image was acquired
at 6:57 UT by the VIIRS ‘day-night band’, which detects light ina range of wavelengths including near-infrared and uses lightintensification to detect dim signals. In this case, the clouds of Isaac
were lit by moonlight.
Isaac, a slow-moving storm, had made landfall as a category-1
hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 130 kph, near themouth of the Mississippi River in southwestern Louisiana around23:45 UT the previous evening, then moved westward, back out

6over water, until making a second landfall near Port Fourchon atabout 9:00 UT on the 29th.
As Isaac weakened, it churned slowly northwest throughout the
day at 9 kph, with a minimum central pressure of 970 millibars. The
heavy rainfall, nearly 50 mm per hour at the centre of the storm,
deposited up to 36 centimetres of rain across much of Louisiana,
southern Mississippi, and southwestern Alabama. Although thickcloud obscures New Orleans itself, the lights of State Capital Baton
Rouge shine through the storm at approximately 10 o’clock.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon,using VIIRS Day Night Band data.

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

Sea water off the east coast of Greenland
looked a bit like marbled paper on October
17, 2012. The shifting swirls of white in this
MODIS image from NOAA’s Aqua satellite
were sea ice. This ice moved discernibly
between October 16 and October 17
because thin, free-drifting ice moves very
easily under the actions of winds andcurrents.
Each year, Arctic sea ice grows throughout
winter, reaching its maximum extent around

March. It then melts during summer, fallingto a minimum in September. By October,
Arctic waters start freezing again. However,
the ice in the image above is more likely tobe remnant old ice that has migrated down
to the coast of Greenland, since seawateris unlikely to start freezing so far south as
early as October.
The Fram Strait between Greenland andSvalbard serves as an expressway for sea
ice exiting the Arctic Ocean. Movement of

www.geo-web.org.uk

ice through the strait used to be offset by
the growth of ice in the Beaufort Gyre and,
until the late 1990s, ice could persist in thegyre for years, growing thicker and moreresistant to melt. Since the start of the 21st
century, however, ice has been less likely tosurvive its journey through the southern partof the Beaufort Gyre. As a result, less Arctic
sea ice has been able to pile up and form
multi-year ice.
NASA image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz
LANCE MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC.

7

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Alan Banks

Towards the end of 2011 there
was considerable debate on the
GEO-Subscribers Yahoo Group about theinadequacies of our website. There weremany suggestions for its improvement but
few offers of actual ‘doing it’.
As I already had experience of managing
three other websites, I offered to do so and,perhaps more importantly, try to maintain it
as current once redrawn. I didn’t anticipate
that it would take so long, nor how much I
would learn over the following year. Backin 2007, with no knowledge of HTML or
CSS, I wrote my first website using the
NVU authoring package and referring to the
Haynes publication Build your own website
by Kyle MacRae. I progressed over theyears to alternative web authoring software
such as Kompozer and Web Dwarf and,for this project, moved to my current editor
Amaya. All the above are freeware.
Amaya is open source software and stillin development, the latest release being
January 2012. I use Amaya as an HTMLand CSS style sheet editor. I like it because
one can easily move between HTML editing
and a WYSIWYG screen. Amaya can be
buggy and sometimes crashes, so one has
to remember to save the work frequently.
Before settling on Amaya I spent sometime exploring the open source Content
Management System Joomla, but ended
up not using this as, when a template or‘module’ failed, you were stuck, and often
the author had moved on. If I had been
starting the site from scratch this might
have been useful, but the migration of one‘drawing’ of the site to another was madeeasier by using an HTML and CSS editor.

8

All this was going on whilst we moved
house and spent several months doing lotsof new house jobs. Eventually, by spring,
I got some of the major pages done. With
much of the rest of the year being taken up
with family and the Olympics, it was only atthe beginning of October that I could saythat the job was done. Now it needs the be
maintained and kept up to date.
I had what I thought was a great dropdown
menu that depended on CSS but didn’t workon iPads and mobile devices. However,
the web is a great place to discover things,
and after several days of searching I foundsome JavaScript that would do the job. This
led me, in a roundabout way, to buying an
iPad for my wife; now she has gone fromzero computer use to avid user of iPad andFacebook in only a month or so. At least I
can use it to check that the website works
on more than just my own PC.
The old site structure had more or lessdisappeared under a mass of unconnected
pages, with out-of-date information andold files. Many useful pages had become
lost from view. I had to decide what was
relevant, where it might go and how it
should be arranged so that the navigation
menu had a reasonably logical construction.
I wanted all this done before writing content
in order that I could have one template forall pages. One of the main advantagesof Amaya is that it immediately tells youwhether there is an HTML error, though
it can be difficult to pinpoint the actual
problem (usually a missing ‘/’ several lines
earlier).
There is a new design and layout throughout
the site and elements can now be changed
www.geo-web.org.uk

without major editing. Every page has thesame banner and menu, which I hope gives
the site a consistent ‘branding’.
Most pages carry a left sidebar with adisplay of random images, mostly of
low resolution, which give a taster as
to what our hobby is all about. On thehome page is a right-hand sidebar which
I intend to develop as a news module towhich approved authors can contribute.
The home page also features 3-hourly
updated imagery from both Meteosat-7 andMeteosat-9 and the ‘Imagery’ menu leads tosome updated satellite imagery, some of it
at high resolution with large pictures.
I hope to keep the website reasonably up-todate with news items. GEO is now present
on Facebook [1] and Twitter [2] and I will try tomaintain the links between these and oursite. I will experiment with further interactive
content and hopefully enable more authors
to contribute.
I would like to thank Rob Denton for allowing
me to edit his piece on HRPT reception and
Les Hamilton for his considerable input on
failed links, the quarterly update pages andmost recently an excellent page on Metop
imagery.

References
1 GEO on Twitter
http://twitter.com/geowebuk
2 GEO on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/
groupforearthobservation

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Esko Petäjä
I participated in a EUMETSAT Land Surface Analysis training
week during late 2011, part of which dealt with forest fire detection.
This experience increased my interest to study more on this topic,
as I already do fire patrolling during summer months as part of myactivity in the local flying club. This article describes forest fires ingeneral and fire detection using MSG and polar orbiting satellites.
Satellite fire detection is mostly used in Africa and Mediterranean
areas where fires are an annual problem. Additionally, I havedescribed fire detection and observation from the point of view of
my native Finland.

To be able to receive fire data through
EUMETCast,• add the following to your channels.ini file:[SAF-Europe]
target_directory=D:\EUMETCast\received

Forest Fires in General
A wildfire is an uncontrolled fire in combustible vegetation, that
occurs in the countryside or a wilderness area. A wildfire differsfrom other fires because of the high speed with which it spreads
out from its original source, the fact that it can change direction
unexpectedly, and its ability to jump gaps such as roads, rivers andfire-breaks. There are several causes: lightning, a volcanic eruption,
sparks from rockfalls and spontaneous combustion. Additionally,
fires are often the result of human activity—like arson, discarded
cigarettes and sparks from equipment.

There are multiple software package’s available to visualise Fire
Risk. I have been testing David Taylor’s HDF viewer.

The biggest forest fires in Europe were those in Greece in 2007,
when a series of massive forest fires broke out in several areas.
The effect was the destruction of 2,700 km2 of forest, as wellas 1,000 houses and 1,100 other buildings; many more weredamaged. Additionally, 84 people lost their lives. To be able toprevent and monitor fires, several satellite applications have beendeveloped as described below. Figure 1 shows smoke from theGreek fires, the source of each outbreak highlighted in red.
Forest Fire Detection using MSG Satellite Data
The development of forest fire detection is done by the Land
Surface Analysis Satellite Applications Facility (LSA SAF) locatedin Portugal. The LSA SAF currently disseminates the following
products on an operational basis:• the Fire Risk Mapping (FRM) product, that provides daily mapsof meteorological fire risk over Mediterranean Europe;• the Fire Detection and Monitoring (FD&M) product, thatprovides a continuous monitoring of fire activity over Africa andEurope;• the Fire Radiative Power (FRP) product that allows theestimation of carbon emissions from the vegetation fires.
These data are used in agricultural and forestry applications,
together with the growing demands for environmental monitoring
and risk management.
Fire Risk Mapping (FRM) product
The FRM product provides daily maps of meteorological fire risk,
specially over Mediterranean Europe, where fires are common
because of the alternating rainy and drought periods. Vegetationthat grows during rainy periods provides good fuel to feed fires
during dry seasons. Fire risk is calculated from vegetation typeaccording to the Global Landcover 2000 Database (GLC200),
which provides information from available fuel and flammability,
information on location and duration of fires, and the Fire Weather
Index using meteorological data to estimate the available fuel andfire spread rate. Figure 2 shows a typical calculated fire risk map.
Fire data is distributed by SAF-Europe, but you need to activate thiswith EUMETCast before you can receive it. The files come in HDF5
format, with filenames such as:
S-LSA_-HDF5_MSG_LSASAF_FRM-F024_Euro_201201251200.hdf5
S-LSA_-HDF5_MSG_LSASAF_FRM-F048_Euro_201201261200.hdf5• in MSG Data Manager, open the Setuptab, click the Channel Selection option, thenthe SAF tab and finally make sure that theLand Surface - LSA option is checked.

http://www.satsignal.eu/software/hdf-viewer.htm

Data visualisation is also available from the LSA website.
http://landsaf.meteo.pt/algorithms.jsp?seltab=18&starttab=18

Fire Detection and Monitoring (FD&M)
The FRP product estimates the Fire Radiative Power generated
during fire events. There are two different presentation methods:
Fire pixel and Fire Grid. The Fire Pixel method presents data from
SEVIRI pixels every 15 minutes, with resolution at the sub-satellite
point a nominal 3 × 3 km. The Fire Grid method provides data
observed by SEVIRI at every 5° of spatial resolution, averaging thetotal FRP measured over 1 hour.
The FRP is measured in megawatts (MW), representing the amountof radiant heat energy emitted from fire within each pixel. The
amount of fuel or biomass burned can be calculated
Fuel biomass burned (kg) = 0.368 (± 0.015) × Fire Radiative Energy (MJ)
Data Visualisation and Delivery
Data is delivered through EUMETCast in the form of HDF5 files.
There are many HDF Viewers available but they need some
scripting to visualise the data. At this time I have not studied them
all in detail and plan to write a dedicated article on how to use themat a future date. I find it a great advantage to enjoy software written
by David Taylor. It’s really easy learn.
Another easy way for visualisation is to use Google Earth (figure 3).
KLM files can be downloaded fromhttp://landsaf.meteo.pt/googleEarth.jsp?hh=00&mm=00

Active Fire Monitoring (CAP)
Active fire monitoring makes use of a fire detection product thatindicates the presence of fire within a pixel. It uses the fact that the
MSG SEVIRI channel IR3.9 is very sensitive to hot spots caused byfires. Additionally to the IR3.9 channel, other channels are used tomake detection more accurate according the following criteria:• Brightness temperature of channel IR3.9• Brightness temperature difference of channels IR3.9 andIR10.8• Difference of the standard deviations of channel IR3.9 andIR10.8• Standard deviation of channel IR3.9• Standard deviation of channel IR10.8
The product data is delivered using CAP (the Common Alerting
Protocol), which is an XML-based data format for exchanging
public warnings and emergency information between alerting
technologies. CAP allows a warning message to be consistently

www.geo-web.org.uk

9

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Figure 5 - An example of CAP XML shown in CAP Validator.

Figure 1 - Forest fires in Greece during 2007.
Image:LANCE/EOSDIS MODIS Rapid Response/NASA/GSFC

Figure 6 - Fire data in the MODIS L1 Viewer.

Figure 2 - Fire risk over Mediterranean Europe - © Eumetcast.

Figure 7 - Fire data in the MODIS L1 Viewer, including a background.

Figure 3 - Fire Radiative Power displayed in Google Earth.

10

Figure 4 - A foresr fire detection tower.

Figure 8 - The effects of the Tuntsa forest fire 40 years on.

Photo © Rajavartiolaitos

Photo © Toinenlinja

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

disseminated simultaneously over many warning systems, andto many applications. CAP increases warning effectiveness andsimplifies the task of activating a warning for responsible officials.
Here is an example of a simple CAP XML file showing fire pixel
position and radius.
<?xml version = “1.0” encoding= “UTF-8”?><alert xmlns = “urn:oasis:names:tc:emergency:cap:1.1”><identifier>urn:oid:2.49.0.3.1.1.MET9</identifier><sender>urn:oid:2.49.0.2.1</sender><sent>2012-10-06T19:15:00-00:00</sent><status>Actual</status><msgType>Alert</msgType><scope>Public</scope><info><category>Geo</category><event>FIRE</event><responseType>Assess</responseType><responseType>Monitor</responseType><urgency>Immediate</urgency><severity>Moderate</severity><certainty>Likely</certainty><effective>2012-10-06T19:00:00-00:00</effective><expires>2012-10-06T19:30:00-00:00</expires><senderName>EUMETSAT</senderName><headline>Fire detection report</headline><description> This is a computer generated report and has not beenreviewed by a human.</description><web>http://oiswww.eumetsat.org/IPPS/html/MSG/PRODUCTS/FIR</
web><area><areaDesc>List of detected fires (latitude, longitude, radius)</areaDesc><circle>-23.642,21.299 1.757</circle><circle>-21.906,-60.848 3.319</circle><circle>-21.866,-60.721 3.305</circle><circle>-21.876,-60.905 3.324</circle><circle>-21.831,-60.686 3.300</circle><circle>-21.836,-60.777 3.310</circle><circle>-21.841,-60.870 3.320</circle>

Figure 9 - A forest fire warning index and flight patrolling map (white).
Image © FMI

Figure 10 - Preparing for a fire protection patrol.

Figure 5 shows an example of a CAP XML file displayed by
Google’s on-line CAP Validator service
http://cap-validator.appspot.com/

The CAP protocol seems to be in early development and at present
files have to be manually exported into the application. I believethat this process will become automated in future versions. The
philosophy behind this protocol is good as it permits multiple
warnings to be displayed on the same map.
Fire Detection using MODIS Satellite Data
MODIS fire data, received on EUMETCast data channel-4, canbe visualized using the MODIS L1 & Fire Viewer from SatSignal
Software. The viewer has two operating modes, manual andautomatic. Manual mode works in a simple way: you just drag anddrop the fire data files for the selected date from File Manager into
MODIS L1 Viewer. The resulting display is shown in figure 6.

Figure 11 - A forest fire near a lake is detected by one of the aerial patrols.

Automated Command Line Operations
The processing of fire files can be automated by using commandline operations. The command line has parameters for file path,picture size, location, projection and file save location. There’s an
example of the command line operation I use in the grey panel at
the foot of this page.
A further development by David Taylor enables the MODIS L1
Viewer to generate and manage background files, which makes
continued on page 34

Figure 12 - Correlating lightning with forest fires in the same area.

Command line options for processing fire files
MODISL1Viewer -fire:e:\EUMETCast\MSG-2\Fire\2012\06\18 -Width:1200 -Height:1200 -Dlat:50 -Dlon:50 -Par:45 -Mer:0 -Proj:Plate -Save:fire.bmp
www.geo-web.org.uk

11

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Anders Höök and Lars-Olof Hilmertz
From October 1–13 this year, my wife and I, and anothercouple from Vallentuna in Sweden, joined a charter tour
to Uzbekistan. Our journey stretched from Nukus in thewestern part of the country over Khiva, Bukhara andSamarkand to Tashkent in the east. Our stay in Nukus
included an excursion to Muynak, the former big fishingport on the South Aral Sea. An excellent local guide, history
graduate Dr Oktyabr Dospanov, who was born near Muynak,
accompanied us.

several metres. Everyone was frightened, but the authorities
assured them that this was nothing to be scared of. Suchthings could happen now and then. They claimed that the sea
level would soon return to normal—but it never did.
It is said that there is a 600-kilometre undergroundconnection between the Aral Sea and the Caspian Sea.
The Caspian Sea has a level some 28 metres below meansea level, while the South Aral Sea lies 29 metres above
it. So water transfer is theoretically possible from the Aral
to the Caspian. It has also been said that the level of the
Caspian Sea increased considerably at the same time. There
are suspicions that some sort of experiment, military orotherwise, was carried out in or near the connection at thattime, but this has never been confirmed. If it was so, it could
have been a tremendous temporary outflow from the Aral Sea
to the Caspian Sea.
The well known disappearance of the sea is described in aseries of posters beside the monument, as shown below. You
can see two of the posters behind the monument in figure 3.

Quite a lot about the Aral Sea has been written in earlier
issues of GEO Quarterly, notably in GEO Q16 and GEO Q34.
It may, however, be appropriate to recall that it is the river
Amu Darya that should be feeding the Aral Sea with waterfrom the south, while Syr Darya is feeding the Northern Aral
Sea.
As we travelled by bus from Nukus to Muynak, a distanceof some 200 kilometres, we could see remnants of the Amu
Darya (figure 1) before finally arriving in Muynak with its
entrance monument (figure 2). When the Aral Sea flourished,
this town was inhabited by more than 100 000 people.
Now, there are fewer than 10 000 people living there, themajority of them partially living on money sent from relatives
elsewhere, or from grants from the state.
We went directly to the big monument commemorating thedisappeared sea (figures 3,4). Our guide told us how, when
he was young, he would accompany his father and others
on a fishing boat from Muynak, and how they sailed far out
on the sea. What we now saw from beneath the monument
was an endless plain stretching to the horizon, litteredwith a number of stranded ships (figure 5). A close up of
one of the ships, with the monument behind can be seenin figure 6. The shipwrecks shown in the photos are moreor less a museum these days. Most of the ships that were
stranded by the receding Aral Sea have now been sold off for
scrap, broken up and taken away. Just those pictured, anda few others, are preserved. A view back towards Muynak
from where the ships now lie is shown in figure 7. Walking
a little bit further into Muynak, we came upon another shippreserved as a monument. You can see it in figure 8, withpart of the town in the background.
Our guide also told us that he remembered about one day
in 1965 that the water level of the Aral Sea suddenly fell by

12

Maps at Muynak illustrating the disappearance of the South Aral Sea

As pinpointed in the article on the Aral Sea in GEO Q34,
there are no plans to restore the Southern Aral Sea; interests
are rather directed towards extraction of oil and gas. We sawsome such installations on our way.
Our guide told us how, some 15 years ago, efforts were madeto stabilise the dusty bed of the sea by planting tamarisk
bushes, which bind the sand; some of these bushes can beseen in figures 5 and 7.
The eastern part of the Southern Aral Sea is nearlynonexistent, while the western part still holds a lot of water.
Its length is roughly 150 km and it is about 30 km wide. Ourvery pleasant and knowledgeable guide told how, every year,
he goes to a camp on the shore of the western part of theSouthern Aral Sea for bathing.

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Figure 1 - The Amu Darya between Nukus and Muynak

Figure 2 - The impressive monument at the entrance of Munyak

Figure 3 - The monument to the Aral Sea in Muynak (front view)

Figure 4 - The monument to the Aral Sea in Muynak (back view)

Figure 5 - Ships stranded in the former South Aral Sea near Muynak

Figure 6 - A close-up view of one of the stranded ships

Figure 7 - The view from the stranded ships back to the shore at Muynak

Figure 8 - A ship-memorial in the town of Muynak

www.geo-web.org.uk

13

GEO Quarterly No 36

14

The Group for Earth Observation

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

proved easy to use. A meter was used to align the dish for
maximum signal reception and, with a strong signal from Eurobird 9
at 9°E carrying EUMETCast transmissions this, was easily
achieved.

Francis BellGEO has recently been supporting the educational group Spacelink
Learning Foundation to establish a mobile EUMETCast receiving
station which will enable them to demonstrate live reception of
EUMETCast images in schools.
For my own mobile EUMETCast station, which I transport to rallies
and exhibitions, I take either a 60 cm or 80 cm dish mounted ona low flat stand. This is easy to deploy but, with its fixed fittings,
is rather bulky to move around. For the Spacelink station, we
discovered the availability of a 60 cm dish complete with a tripod
stand designed to fold up and pack into a bag not much bigger thanthe diameter of its dish. This was judged to be a potentially usefulpiece of equipment for a mobile station.
This dish is supplied by CPC Farnell, as their Portable Satellite Kit(Order code: AP02012, Manufacturer Part No: 120.791), at a costof £98.27, including VAT and delivery. To contact the company go towww.cpc.farnell.com/dishes

I think this tripod mounted dish may be a useful asset for any GEO
member operating a mobile receiving station, or even for someone
at their own home where planning requirements may restrict the
deployment of too many permanent dishes.
Note
Although EUMETSAT recommend a dish slightly larger than 60 cm
for EUMETCast reception, my 60 cm dish has proved satisfactoryfrom many locations in England.

Francis Bell
This was the fourth time that GEO has run a stand at the
National HamFest, held on the Newark showground. The
event proved as popular and successful as ever, with many
hundreds of visitors attending on both the Friday andSaturday. The GEO stand proved to be very popular with its
displays of EUMETCast and APT images plus our literature.
Many visitors expressed interest for their personal receptionof weather satellites and took away our leaflets, which outline
how this could be readily achieved. Some visitors wereinterested enough to join GEO on the spot, and a number ofothers renewed their memberships. Several visitors, whose
own past careers were in the space industry, were impressedwith what could be achieved so easily at home.

The Farnell tripod mounted 60 cm dish is shown on the right of thisphotograph with the author’s fixed-mount 60 cm dish is on the left.

Kit Specification
This portable satellite dish kit is ideal for digital satellite reception
when camping or touring. The 60 cm elliptical dish has a folding
LNB arm for ease of transportation and includes a universal LNB,
lightweight aluminium tripod and a tough black weatherproof carrybag. Also included are a satellite finder, compass, 3 x 230 mm
hooked securing pins and 15 m of white coax cable with four
F-plugs and rubber sleeve.
Technical Data
LNB gain
LNB input frequency
LNB noise figure
LNB output frequency
Overall weight
Tripod heightFrancis Bell and GEO’s company secretary Nadine Bell, pictured
after setting up the GEO stand at the National HamFest on theThursday, prior to the two event days of Friday and Saturday.

65 dB
10.7 - 12.75 GHz
0.3 dB
950-2150 MHz
7 kg
1 metreThe first use of the dish was very encouraging and straightforward.
The tripod provided the fixed base, and the outward foldingarm—which carried the LNB—locked into position without further
adjustment. With the tripod placed in a position for the approximate
direction of the satellite, signal fine adjustments for azimuth andelevation were provided by swivel points and wing nuts which

Two members visiting the GEO stand at Newark. Conversation
revealed that they were very talented with the use of computers andtheir multi-tasking capabilities including weather satellite reception.

www.geo-web.org.uk

15

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

September 20, 2010

October 1, 2010

With temperatures dropping in the northern hemisphere, autumn
colours swept across the taiga forests of the Kamchatka Peninsula
in October 2010. Within a span of 11 days, the forests of far
eastern Siberia changed from green to deep brown. The Moderate
Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua
satellite captured the transformation beautifully in the two images
on these two images.

colour in leaves fades, allowing other pigments such as carotenoids
and anthocyanins to display their colours. Carotenoids absorb bluegreen and blue light, and in the absence of chlorophyll they cause
leaves to appear yellow. Anthocyanins absorb blue, blue-green, andgreen light, and light reflecting off them appears red.

The top image dates from October 1 and the other from
September 20. The forests shown surround the snow-covered
active volcanos of Bezymianny, Klyuchevskaya, and Shiveluch.
In autumn, leaves change colour as they lose the green chlorophyll
which absorbs red and blue components from the sunlight striking
their surfaces. As the concentration of chlorophyll drops, the green

16

The range and intensity of autumn colours is strongly affectedby the weather. Low temperatures and bright sunshine destroy
chlorophyll, but temperatures above freezing make it easier foranthocyanins to form. Dry weather, which increases the sugarconcentration in sap, also increases the amount of anthocyanin.
So the brightest autumn colours occur when dry, sunny days arefollowed by cool, dry nights.
NASA Earth Observatory images by Robert Simmon,
courtesy of the LANCE/EOSDIS MODIS Rapid Response Team, GSFC.

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

NASA Earth Observatory
The Greek holiday island of
Chios, fifth largest in the AegeanSea, was hit by a devastating
wildfire which broke out in theearly morning of August 18.
With strong winds fanning theflames, numerous villages had tobe evacuated, the residents left
watching from the beaches as fireravaged their islands forests andarable land. Local media reported
that smoke from the fire could
be seen from Crete, almost 100
kilometres to the south. Several
hundred firefighters, soldiersand volunteers battled with theblaze over four days, by whichtime almost 13,000 hectares,
comprising almost half of theisland’s forest and farmland, hadbeen destroyed. But gale-force
winds hampered their efforts,
preventing water-bombing aircraftfrom flying over the conflagration.
The most serious casualty of
the fire was Chios’ gum mastic
industry. Pistacia lentiscus
is a deciduous shrub, widely
cultivated throughout Chios for
its aromatic resin—known as
mastic— which is used worldwide as a cooking spice and forother culinary purposes, as wellas in pharmaceutical products.
Mastic possesses antibacterial
and anti-fungal properties, and is
widely used in the manufacture ofointments for skin disorders.
Mastic resin has long been a major
source of income for the islandersof Chios, but with more than half of
its mastic orchards destroyed, thefire has been a massive financial
disaster. The orchards must now
be replanted, but It could be as
long as eight years before the
shrubs become mature enough tostart producing mastic again. The
importance of this crop can begauged from the fact that, In 2011,
53% of the European Union’s
entire mastic production camefrom Chios.
This MODIS image, acquired fromNASA’s Aqua satellite, shows
the Chios smoke plume drifting
towards Crete on August 18, 2012.
NASA image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz
LANCE MODIS Rapid Response Team
Goddard Space Flight Center

www.geo-web.org.uk

17

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Les Hamilton
Twenty five years ago, on September 16, 1987, scientists
and policymakers unveiled what the United Nations called‘the most successful treaty in UN history’. On that day, thefirst 24 nations signed the Montreal Protocol on Substancesthat Deplete the Ozone Layer. In the years since, the numberof signatory nations has risen to 197. This international
agreement has set an example on how to develop andimplement environmental policy, and has almost certainly
saved our planet from an environmental crisis.
Prompted by scientific observations from the laboratory,
the ground, aircraft, and satellites, the Montreal Protocol
first reduced—then later banned completely—the useof halogenated hydrocarbons, most specifically CFCs
(chlorofluorocarbons) that destroy atmospheric ozone. The
destruction of the ozone layer allows more of the sun’s
ultraviolet radiation to reach the surface of the planet,increasing the risk of sunburn, skin cancer and eye damage.
The most prominent and infamous sign of depletion is theannual ‘ozone hole’ that forms around the South Pole [1,2].

The Ozone Hole map for 1987

The Ozone Hole maximum of 2006
Map of the Ozone Hole for 1979

The images on this page show the Antarctic ozone hole on
September 16 (the International Day for the Preservation of
the Ozone Layer) in the years 1979, 1987, 2006, and 2011.
The first two maps are based on data from the Total Ozone
Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) on the Nimbus-7 satellite.
The others were made using data from the Ozone Monitoring
Instrument on NASA’s Aura satellite. Though acquired bydifferent instruments, the data sets have all been crosscalibrated and reanalysed by scientific models.
Stratospheric ozone is typically measured in Dobson
Units (DU). One DU is that concentration of the gas in theatmospheric column that would create a layer of pure ozone
0.01 millimetre deep at 0°C and standard atmosphericpressure. On average, the total ozone in the atmosphericcolumn amounts to 300 DU, equivalent to a layer 3 mm deep
were it concentrated at Earth’s surface.

18

www.geo-web.org.uk

The Ozone Hole shows a slight decrease in 2011

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

1974

In the late 1970s, a springtime ‘hole’, an area with total ozone concentration below 220 DU, started
to develop in the ozone layer above Antarctica. British researchers stationed on the ice of Halley
Bay, Antarctica, made this discovery using ground-based measurements (red). In later years, datafrom NASA satellites corroborated the discovery (blue) and mapped the extent of the hole.
NASA graph by Robert Simmon, based on data from the
British Antarctic Survey and GSFC Atmospheric Composition TeamIn 1979, when scientists were
just starting to understand that
atmospheric ozone was suffering
depletion over Antarctica, theminimum concentration had fallen
to 194 DU, while the depleted area—
the so-called Ozone Hole—extended
over 1.1 million km2. In 1987, as theMontreal Protocol was being signed,
ozone concentration had fallen to
109 DU and the hole had expanded to22.4 million km2.
By 2006, the worst year for ozone
depletion, the numbers were 84 DU
and 29.6 million km2. By 2011, themost recent year with a complete dataset, the hole stretched 26 million km2
and dropped to 95 DU, suggesting thatmatters were stabilising and that aslow recovery might be taking place.
The amount of ozone-depleting
substances (ODS) in the atmosphere
has stopped rising in recent years andmay now actually be decreasing. But
the ozone hole will continue to show
its hand for many years to come, since
CFCs and other ODSs can endure in
the atmosphere for many decades.
What if CFCs had not been banned?
Ozone is Earth’s natural sunscreen,
absorbing most of the incoming
ultraviolet (UV) radiation from the sunand protecting life from DNA-damaging
radiation. CFCs, first used as
refrigerants in the 1930s and lateras propellants for chemical sprays,
diffuse through the atmosphere where
they destroy the ozone molecules.
In May 2009, a team of NASA-ledscientists set out to predict how theozone layer would have developed
today—and in the future—if theMontreal Protocol Treaty banningozone-depleting chemicals had notcome into being. The series of images
at the right of this page shows
projected levels of ozone concentration
over the mid-latitudes of the Western
Hemisphere. These are based on
calculations by the Goddard Earth

Observing System Chemistry-Climate
Model, and concluded that, by the year
2050, global ozone depletion would be
at least 10 times worse than currently.
The series of images starts with
1974, before CFCs had begun to
do significant damage to the ozone
layer. Concentrations of ozone in
the stratosphere over the UnitedStates and Canada are high. By
1994, the model predicts that ozone
concentrations over the region havefallen from highs in excess of 500 DU
to about 400 DU. By the simulated
year 2009, the ozone layer over muchof the United States has thinned toonly 300 DU.
Moving forward to 2020, the model
predicts that an ozone hole, defined asa region where the ozone concentration
has fallen below 220 DU, forms over
the Arctic as well as the Antarctic.
By 2040, the ozone hole has become
global, allowing the UV index in midlatitude cities to reach 15 around noon
on a clear summer day. A figure of
10 is considered extreme by today’s
standards. By the end of the model
run in 2050, global ozone has dropped
to less than 110 DU, a 67% reduction
since the 1970s.
To learn more about the experimentand what it taught scientists about
stratospheric circulation, read theEarth Observatory feature The WorldWe Avoided by Protecting the Ozone
Layer at.

1994

2009

2020

2040

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/
Features/WorldWithoutOzone/

References
1 The Expanding Ozone HoleGEOQ 13, page 4 (2007)
2 Record Loss of Ozone over the Arctic
GEOQ 30, page 37 (2011)

2050

Acknowledgement
Thanks to NASA Earth Observatory for making
much of the information collected for thisarticle available on their web pages.
www.geo-web.org.uk

NASA images courtesy of the Goddard Space Flight Center
Scientific Visualization Studio.

19

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

The Beaufort Sea viewed on May 13, 2012

The Beaufort Sea viewed on June 16, 2012

These two images from the Moderate Resolution Imaging
Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite illustrate
the rapid ice retreat in the Beaufort Sea, north of Alaska, between
May 13 and June 16 last summer. This rapid melt was part of alarger phenomenon as sea ice across the entire Arctic reached arecord-low level for the time of year, slightly below the June 2010
record.
During the first half of June 2012, the Beaufort Sea was a ‘hotspot’of rapid retreat, driven by a high pressure system over the region
that kept skies clear at the very time of year when sunlight lasts
the longest. In addition, larger-scale climate patterns were alsofavouring ice retreat along the coastlines of Alaska and Siberia.

20

As of June 18, temperatures were above freezing over much of
the sea ice in the Arctic, and snow had melted earlier than normal,
leading to warming on land. The following day, NSIDC [1] reported
that ‘Recent ice loss rates have been 100,000 to 150,000 squarekilo meters per day, more than double the climatological rate.’
For comparison, the area of England plus Wales is 151,000 km2.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen, using data from the Level 1 andAtmospheres Active Distribution System (LAADS).

Reference N
1 National Snow and Ice Data Center

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

David Taylor

The 12:01 UT NOAA-19 (left) and 15:36 UT NOAA-15 images on August 4, 2012

The 12:37 UT NOAA-19 (left) and 16:30 UT NOAA-15 images on August 10, 2012

Despite the wealth of high quality imagery available via
EUMETCast these days, I still monitor the NOAA satellites
from time to time, despite the generally poor reception
available in Edinburgh.
One thing that interested me recently was the comparison
between the near overhead, approximately noon images fromNOAA-19 and the mid-afternoon images from NOAA-15.
With the sun being less in line with the satellite during the
mid-afternoon image, much more detail can be seen in theclouds because of the shadows which are now visible. The

same applies to some of the land topography as well, showing
more detail. These afternoon images are an artefact of thegradual change in NOAA-15’s orbit plane over the years: thesatellite started life as a morning satellite in 1998 but has
gradually drifted over the last 14 years.
Images like the one above only become available during thesummer, since, as winter approaches and daylight fades,
the satellite switches to sending mid-IR data instead of the
0.8 micrometre visible wavelength channel. So, if you are
missing summer already, here’s something to look forward to
next year.

www.geo-web.org.uk

21

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

This satellite image shows the cloud tops of Hurricane Sandy
illuminated by a nearly full moon. The lights of Florida’s urban
areas and the USA’s eastern seaboard shine through therelatively thin clouds on the periphery of the hurricane. At thetime the image was acquired by the Visible Infrared Imaging

22

Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) aboard the Suomi-NPP satellite
on October 26, 2012, the hurricane was centred near the
Bahamas, with maximum winds of 140 kilometres per hour.
NASA image by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon, using VIIRS Day-Night Band datafrom the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi NPP) and the University of
Wisconsin’s Community Satellite Processing Package.

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

www.geo-web.org.uk

GEO Quarterly No 36

23

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Steve Craggs - VE3KSC
I live in Petrolia ,Ontario, Canada, which is 200 kilometres
west of Toronto. My weather equipment consists of a homebuilt DCDP antenna feeding an R2FX receiver. One of thephotographs shows me installing this antenna.
I feed the R2FX audio out to a SignaLink USB externalsoundcard which gives me manual control of the audio
strength to the computer. The laptop runs Windows XP and I
use APTDecoder software.
I have had great success with this setup, giving me niceimages of North America and the Caribbean. The best time of
the year is Hurricane Season, between June and November.
Using my 5-year old laptop is OK for APT work, but I would
like to get into HRPT. So I have built a powerful desktop PC
consisting of an ASUS Sabertooth Mobo motherboard fittedwith an AMD 1090T 3.2 GHz 6-core processor with 8 GB of
RAM. For storage I have a 60 GB SSD and a terabyte hard
drive.
I hope to buy a DVB receiver and antenna this summer
and start receiving beautiful images like those I see in
GEO Quarterly.

A NOAA visible image featuring an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico
Steve’s communications desk with his R2FX at upper left

Steve up the mast installing the APT antenna

Steve’s home-built double-cross antenna

24

I hope you enjoyed the quick tour of my shack. And I would
like to give a thanks to all the people who put together such ahigh quality magazine as GEO.

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Fred van den BoschFred van den Bosch has devised an ingenious way of creating composite APT images thatcompletely fill his radio horizon. The image on this page shows the result of his efforts.

After reading Rob Denton’s article in GEO Quarterly 35 about
creating composite APT images using WXtoImg, I thought readers
would be interested to learn about a technique that I have beenusing to create a ‘continuous’ image.
Since end of last year, I have been making a ‘year-long’ composite
image by using %y-%e in the capture definition. This means thatevery new APT image is superimposed on the previous one(s) andadded to the composite. The result is that, over time, the image you
see more or less matches your radio horizon.

make copies of my image after each run. This process is triggered
by WXtoImg’s WxpEnd option. Unfortunately, this starts immediately
after the reception of the satellite signal has finished, not whencreation of the image is complete. The result is that my backup
image is always one image behind.
Early this year, Craig Anderson promised a better solution, but up
till now there is no update. Every evening I check to see if I must
replace the image on the website by a backup-image.
You can see my daily results on

There is the disadvantage, of course, that a bad image can ruin
your whole composite. Therefore I use Autohotkey to automaticallywww.geo-web.org.uk

http://www.fredvandenbosch.nl/wxtoimg.html

25

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

Suomi-NPP VIIRS Day-Night Band image by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon

26

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Northern Lights over North America as images by the Suomi-NPP satellite

Overnight on October 4-5, 2012, a mass of energetic particles
from the atmosphere of the Sun were flung out into space, aphenomenon known as a coronal mass ejection. Three days later,
the storm from the Sun stirred up the magnetic field around Earthand produced gorgeous displays of the Northern Lights. NASAsatellites track such storms from their origin to their crossing ofinterplanetary space to their arrival in the atmosphere of Earth.
Using the ‘day-night band’ (DNB) of the Visible Infrared Imaging
Radiometer Suite (VIIRS), the Suomi National Polar-orbiting
Partnership (Suomi NPP) satellite acquired this view of the Aurora
Borealis early on the morning of October 8, 2012. The northernlights stretch across Canada’s Quebec and Ontario provinces andare part of the auroral oval that expanded to mid latitudes.
The DNB sensor detects dim light signals such as auroras, airglow,
gas flares, city lights, and reflected moonlight. In the case of theimage opposite, the sensor detected the visible light emissions asenergetic particles rained down from Earth’s magnetosphere andinto the gases of the upper atmosphere. The images are similar to
those that have been collected by the Operational Linescan System
flown on US Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP)
satellites for the past three decades.
‘When I first saw images like this as a graduate student, I was
immediately struck by the fluid dynamic characteristics of theaurora’, said Tom Moore, a space physicist at NASA’s Goddard
Space Flight Center. ‘Viewing the aurora in this way makes it
immediately clear that space weather is an interaction of fluids
from the Sun with those of the Earth’s upper atmosphere. The
electrodynamics make for important differences between plasmas
and ordinary fluids, but familiar phenomena such as waves andvortices are still very apparent. It makes me wonder at the ability ofapparently empty space to behave like a fluid.’
Auroras typically occur when solar flares and coronal massejections—or even a particularly active solar wind stream—disturb

and distort the magnetosphere, the cocoon of space protected by
Earth’s magnetic field. The collision of solar particles and pressure
into our planet’s magnetosphere accelerates particles trapped in thespace around Earth (such as in the radiation belts). These particles
are sent crashing down into Earth’s upper atmosphere—at altitudesof 100 to 400 kilometers—where they excite oxygen and nitrogenmolecules which release photons of light. The results are rays,
sheets, and curtains of light, dancing in the night sky.
Auroras are a beautiful expression of the connection between
Sun and Earth, but not all of the connections are benign. Auroras
are associated with geomagnetic storms, which can distort radio
communications (particularly at high frequencies), disrupt electric
power systems on the ground and give slight but detectable dosesof radiation to flight crews aboard spacecraft and passengers on
high-latitude aeroplane flights.
The advantage of images like those from VIIRS and DMSP is
their resolution, according to space physicist Patrick Newell of theJohns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory: ‘You cansee very fine detail in the aurora because of the low altitude andthe high resolution of the camera’. Most aurora scientists prefer
to use images from missions dedicated to aurora studies (suchas Polar, IMAGE, and ground-based imagers), which can offer
many more images of a storm (rather than just one per orbit) andallow researchers to calculate the energy moving through theatmosphere. There are no science satellites currently in orbit thatprovide such a view, though astronauts regularly photograph andfilm auroras from the International Space Station.
Acknowledgements
NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon
and the University of Wisconsin’s Community Satellite Processing
Package. Suomi NPP is the result of a partnership between NASA,
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and theDepartment of Defense. Caption by Mike Carlowicz.

www.geo-web.org.uk

27

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Mike Stevens
The MODIS L1 Viewer is another fine software developmentfrom our friend, David Taylor, designed to make use of thevisual and fire data from the MODIS instruments aboard
NASA’s Aqua and Terra satellites. These data, which
are available free of charge, are disseminated over the
EUMETCast broadcast system: all you need to do to receive
them is to register for them with EUMETSAT.
Once you have obtained verification from EUMETSAT thatyou are configured to receive the data you will have to carryout some modifications to your system, as follows:• You will have to enable data channel-4. If you arealready receiving the hourly FSD data no change isneeded; if not, then you must add the following line toyour recv-channels.ini file:[EUMETSAT Data Channel 4]target_directory=received• The next operation is to open your MSG DataManager
program and select the Setup tab, then open the
Channel Selection tab followed by the Other tab (figure 1).
Here you will find, in the 3rd column, a box marked
MODIS L1/L2 data.
You must tick the boxes labelled Manage MODIS L1/L2
and Copy M02 sensor files. You then need to adjust theData retention box to the desired number of days. This
determines how long MODIS data is retained on yourcomputer before it is automatically deleted. In my setup,
I have set it at two days.

Figure 1 - Configuring MSG DataManager to receive MODIS data

• For the MODIS Fire data you will need to enable datachannel-12. If you already have this in the system, thenno need to bother. If not, then add this line in therecv.channels.ini file:[EUMETSAT Data Channel 12]
target_directory=received• To receive the Fire Data you will need to return to thesame section as before in MSG DataManager and tick theboxes for CH-12 Data, Manage fire data and Unzip Fire HDF. Again,
adjust the Data retention box to your own preference.
Some other operators of this system may have tagged themdifferently. However, it’s up you how you tag them. This is
the way I have them tagged and it works fine. Tagging themseparately will reduce the load on the ‘received’ directory.
Once you have all these new parameters in place and yourEKU Key has been reset by EUMETSAT, you should switch
to the directory where all the MSG-1 images are stored. Openthe ‘Images’ directory, which should display a list of all the
separate received files. If you scroll down you should see a
directory marked ‘MODIS-L1’. Open this directory and you
should see your MODIS data files—indexed by year, day andtime of the pass—for each day of reception (according to thenumber of days you elected to store when adjusting the Dataretention box).
The MODIS filenames take the form:
thin_MOD021KM.A2012271.1440.005.20122711621221.NRT.hdf
Displaying the Data
Typical MODIS L1 files received via EUMETCast all have theformat shown above but, of course, they vary due to different

28

Figure 2 - This Aqua image shows the weather system that brought severe
flooding to Andalusia in southern Spain on September 29, 2012.

www.geo-web.org.uk

Image © EUMETSAT 2012

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Figure 3 - The MODIS L1 Viewer browser tab, illustrating the squares that represent the downloaded image segments

dates and times of reception. But, as soon files are being
received on your system, you should be able to open the
MODIS-L1 Viewer software to make some final adjustments.

will find two active tabs above the image marked Aqua andTerra. These allow you to make on-screen selections from files
from either satellite.

You need to locate the MODIS L1 File source directory which,with the setup described above, you should find in
C:\MSG-1\Images\MODIS-L1\ by using the Browse option in the Filemenu. The same also applies for the MODIS Fire files source
directory, which you should find in C:\MSG-1\Images\Fire\.

To open a MODIS file, just place the mouse icon into one ofthe data squares and left-click to highlight it: then right-clickin the box to bring up another box marked ‘open one or open
multiple’— that’s your choice. Just highlight the one youwant and double-click. Immediately, the Raw Images tab will be
displayed containing the default image.

Whilst you are in the
MODIS L1 Viewer Setuptab, you will find various
operations that you canuse. The software installswith default settings
already in place foryou, but you may wish
to enhance or change
them to meet your own
specifications. Featuresthat you do need to set
up are the Boundary and City
Locations options (figure 4).
These are contained in thesame countries.dat file used
by WXtrack, and which
normally resides in the
WXtrack directory. If you
do not already have this fileinstalled, you can download
countries.dat from

Along the top of this image appear numbered buttons whichallow you to display, at your leisure, any one of the eighteen
MODIS channels distributed by EUMETCast (figure 5). A
descriptive list of them can be found on David Taylor’s
excellent website at
http://www.satsignal.eu/software/modis-L1-viewer.html

Figure 4
Adjusting the Boundary Data

http://www.satsignal.eu/software/countries.zip

and extract it into your MODIS L1 Viewer directory instead.
Now, upon opening the Modis L1 Viewer software, theprogram will automatically look into the MODIS directory anddisplay all the received segments on the World Map display in
the Browser tab as squares of data (figure 3). Also if you haveupdated to version 3.0.4.138 of the program or higher, you

Figure 5 - Part of the Raw Images tab showing the channel buttons

By default, the display shows the Channel-31 image, which
relates to land surface and cloud temperatures. A click on
the GEO button at the left will show you the track of the image
displayed.
continued on page 44

www.geo-web.org.uk

29

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Les Hamilton
The Arctic Ocean
On September 16, 2012, the cover of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean
fell to a historic summer minimum of just 3.41 million km2, by aconsiderable margin the lowest seasonal minimum recorded since
the satellite record began in 1979. The previous record, recorded
in 2007, was broken by a whopping 760,000 km2, a reduction of
18% (an area twice that of Germany), and a figure that reinforces
the long-term downward trend. A comparison with the 1979-2000
mean sea ice minimum is quite an eye-opener: a reduction of
3.29 million km2, a drop of 49%, and an area equivalent to that ofthe Indian subcontinent. The orange line in figure 1 shows the 1979
to 2000 median extent for this day, the black cross indicating thelocation of the geographic North Pole.
Since the spring 2012 maximum extent on March 20, 11.83 million
square kilometres of ice had been lost, the largest summer
reduction in the satellite record by rather more than one million
square kilometers. Figure 2 graphs the daily Arctic sea ice extent
for 2012 (defined as the area of ocean carrying at least 15% of
ice cover), along with comparative figures for 2005 and 2007 (theprevious years with record lows) and the 1979-2000 average. The
grey area around the latter shows the two standard deviation rangeof the data. The seasonal ice minima between 2007 and 2012 arecollectively the six lowest figures within the satellite record.
It is acknowledged that the 2007 minimum resulted from winds
and elevated air temperatures that favoured summer melting.
But this year weather conditions were generally near average.
Summer temperatures across the Arctic, though slightly
warmer than average, were certainly cooler than in 2007.

Figure 1 - The record-breaking sea ice minimum of September 16, 2012
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder, Colorado.

One possible factor was the unusually powerful cyclonic storm thatformed north of Alaska on August 5 and which tracked into thecentral Arctic Ocean (figure 3). On August 6, its central pressure
had dropped to 964 hPa, an extremely low value for this region.
Persisting for several days, the storm initially brought warm andvery windy conditions to the Chukchi and East Siberian seas. Suchpolar cyclones are more usual in winter, and only a handful of thisstrength have ever been recorded over the Arctic during August
since satellite records began 34 years ago.
Since the Arctic ice cover is becoming ever more dominated byseasonal ice [1], it seems probable that this thinner ice was broken
up and melted by the storm. This storm apart, the pressure patternduring the 2012 summer did not appear to have been as favourable
for promoting ice loss as was the case in 2007—and yet a newrecord low occurred. Arctic storms can have a large impact on sea
ice by• tearing large swaths of ice from the main pack andpushing them to warmer waters• churning the ice into fragments and making it slushier• pulling warmer waters up from the depths of the Arctic
OceanEntering the melt season, the thinner ice cover made the Arctic
sea ice more vulnerable to weather, and the storm quickly broke
it up, after which melting accelerated through the action of wind
and waves. Figure 4 shows the distribution of ice at the time of the2012 minimum compared with that of 2007. Dark grey shows where
ice was present only in 2007, white where ice was present only in
2012: light grey represents locations where sea ice was present inboth years.

30

Figure 2 - Daily Arctic sea ice extent as at September 17, 2012
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center

The spatial pattern of ice extent at this year’s minimum differsfrom that in 2007, with more ice in some parts of the central Arctic
Ocean but less in the Beaufort Sea, the western Laptev Sea, theEast Greenland Sea and parts of the Canadian Archipelago. The
Northern Sea Route across Russia opened around mid August thisyear, whereas in 2007 a tongue of ice stretching to the coastline
blocked the route throughout the summer.
The Antarctic Paradox
It is well known that temperatures in the Antarctic have been
gradually rising for many decades now [2]. Records from groundstations, most of them based in the Antarctic peninsula and aroundwww.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Figure 3 - This powerful cyclonic storm was imaged over the Arctic Ocean by the MODIS instrument aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite on August 7, 2012.
NASA image by Jeff Schmaltz, LANCE/EOSDIS Rapid Response

the edges of the continent, have been recording temperature
data since 1957. These indicate that much of East Antarctica has
experienced cooling since 1978.
But now the record has been extended by gathering measurementsfrom a series of Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer(AVHRR) instruments deployed on satellites since 1981. By
applying statistical methods to this data, scientists have been able
to estimate temperatures missing from ground-based observations
and correlate them with the ground measurements from 1957 to1981 to calculate what the satellites would have observed.
The new analysis shows that Antarctic surface temperatures
increased by an average of 0.12°C per decade between 1957 and2006, representing a rise of more than 0.5°C over the past half
century. West Antarctica warmed at an even higher rate, rising
0.17°C per decade, results which serve to confirm the earlier
findings based on limited weather station and ice core data. Even

Figure 4 - Comparative sea ice distribution for 2007 and 2012
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center

www.geo-web.org.uk

31

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

though certain areas of East Antarctica have been cooling inrecent decades, the longer 50-year trend tells us that, on average,
temperatures are rising across the entire continent.
West Antarctica is particularly vulnerable to climate changes
because its ice sheet is grounded below sea level and surroundedby floating ice shelves. Should it melt completely, global sea level
would rise by between five and six metres.
However, notwithstanding this temperature increase, satellite
observations also show clearly that the maximum extent of wintersea ice surrounding the Southern Continent is increasing—notdecreasing due to the warming as you might at first expect. Indeed,just ten days following the 2012 Arctic summer sea ice minimum,
the winter sea ice extent in the Southern Ocean around Antarctica
expanded to an all-time high of 19.44 million km2. Figure 5
illustrates this: the seasonal winter ice envelope is displayed inwhite with a superimposed orange line showing the 1979 to 2000
median extent for that day of the year. The black cross indicatesthe geographic South Pole. The September 2012 monthly averagealso showed a record high, at 19.39 million km2, slightly above theprevious record of 2006.
The graph in figure 6 shows the Antarctic sea ice extent on
September 30, 2012 as a blue line, with the 1979 to 2000 averagein dark grey. Once again, the light grey band straddling this line
represents the two standard deviation range of the data.

Figure 5 - The record-breaking sea ice maximum of September 26, 2012
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder, Colorado.

The increase in the extent of Antarctic sea ice is an interesting
response to changes in circulation patterns in the Southern
Hemisphere. While the Arctic was experiencing a record minimum
sea ice extent, the Antarctic attained its highest ever sea ice level
during the satellite record. The 1979 to 2012 trend for sea ice
maximum is just above the statistical significance level—0.9%
per decade, plus or minus 0.6%—and this new September value
is slightly greater than typical year-to-year variations: roughly
equivalent a 40 kilometre northward shift of the ice edge relative tothe 1979 to 2000 average. The trend for ice extent growth during
Antarctic winters is about 16,000 square kilometres per year, justover a third the area of The Netherlands, and only one fifth themagnitude of Arctic ice loss (figures 7,8).
The warming climate experienced by much of the Antarctic
is related to two factors: warming of the Pacific Ocean andstrengthening circumpolar winds. This warming, allied with ozone
loss [3], act to strengthen the circumpolar winds in the south of thecontinent, which generally act to blow the sea ice northward, slightly
increasing its extent. The only significant exception to this is aroundthe Antarctic peninsula where, due to the geography of the region,
increasing winds from the north push the ice southward. Thus, sea
ice extent near the northwestern Antarctic Peninsula continues
to decline rapidly, while areas in the Ross Sea and the southern
Indian Ocean show significant increases.
A direct comparison between winter and summer sea ice trends forthe two poles is problematic because the processes at work in eachhemisphere differ. During summer, surface melt and ice-albedo
feedbacks are in effect; winter processes include snowfall on thesea ice, and wind. Small changes in winter extent may be a more
mixed signal than the loss of summer sea ice extent. An expansionof winter Antarctic ice could be due to cooling, winds, or snowfall,
whereas Arctic summer sea ice decline is more closely linked todecadal climate warming.

Figure 6 - Daily Antarctic sea ice extent as at September 30, 2012
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder, Colorado.

Figure 7 - Yearly September average sea ice extent over the Arctic
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder, Colorado.

References
1 Oldest sea ice is disappearing - GEOQ 34, page 16
2 Satellites Confirm Half-Century of West Antarctic Warming
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/warming_antarctica.html
3 The Ozone Hole - This issue, page 18

Acknowledgement
This report would not have been possible without extensive
reference to news reports from the National Snow and Ice Data
Center in Boulder Colorado at
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

32

Figure 8 - Yearly September average sea ice extent over the Antarctic
Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder, Colorado.

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Robert Moore
The morning of October 4 brought some welcome blue sky to northWales. At 08:00 UT there was, however, considerable evidenceof convective cloud over southwest Lancashire, which included aspectacular anvil cloud (figure 1).
By 09:30, a long line of cumulus cloud was to be seen stretchingfrom east to west to the north of Liverpool (figure 2). An extended
version of this panoramic photograph has been used as themasthead image on the front cover of this issue.
Some of these clouds later developed vigorous convective activity,
creating more ‘anvils’. This cloud structure can be seen very clearlyin the 09:48 UT NOAA-16 pass (figure 3). The viewpoint for the
pictures and for the reception of the HRPT image is indicated by thesquare on the satellite image.

Newfoundland, on September 28, 2012.

Some time back, I challenged readers to submit their images
showing how far east they could ‘see’ with their APT systems.

Figure 1 - A spectacular anvil cloud.

Now I’m laying down the gauntlet again, only this time it’s: “How Far
West can you see?”. I captured the image above from a NOAA-19
northbound pass on September 28, using a Dartcom System II
receiver and a WiMo sloping crossed dipole antenna. The location
was North Leverton, just 5 miles east of Retford in Nottinghamshire,
GPS coordinates 53.319°N -0.838°W.
Dare you be brave enough to beat me? I’m sure those living westof me can; perhaps even those situated to my east if they areusing a beam antenna. The prize, which will be awarded to thereader capturing the ‘farthest west’ image, will be a bag of homeground flour, either wholemeal or strong white, freshly ground at thewindmill in North Leverton with Habblesthorpe. There will also be
another surprise gift if the image also beats my one.

Figure 2 - Panoramic photograph showing cloud stretching along the horizon.

I’m waiting for those entries to flood in, no matter how scratchy. Ifthey beat me you win the prize. Entries are open only to mainland
UK to make the challenge fair.
Submit your entries tointernational@geo-web.org.uk

For all other GEO members throughout the world, I have also asmall prize lined up for the best APT image you can send me. To
have the chance of winning a prize, send them to the address
above.
It doesn’t matter where in the world you live or what area you
capture. Good luck!
Closing date is April 30, 2012 and the winners will be revealedin the June 2013 GEO Quarterly. You should have plenty time tosearch for images of Newfoundland and beyond, which will be
accepted in both visible light and infrared formats.
Rob Denton G4YRZ

Figure 3 - North Wales, imaged by NOAA-16 at 09:48 UT on October 4, 2012.

www.geo-web.org.uk

33

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

Fire Detection and Monitoring
continued from page 11

it possible to view fires against different backgrounds, such as
weather images. It is also possible to generate background picturesfrom a selected area by processing files from a complete day,but including only images which show something from the areain scope. Figure 7 shows fires against a MODIS satellite image
background.
Forest Fires in Finland
Forest fires in Finland are different from those in Mediterranean
areas. Typically fires are very small and localised. There have been
only a few big fires in recent times:
1959 Isojoen-Honkajoki fire,
about 1 700 ha
1960 Tuntsa fire - about
120 000 ha (20 000 ha in
Finland)1970 Kalajoki fire - about
1 600 ha1970 Liminka - about 500 ha
1992 Lieksa - about 150 ha
1997 Laihian - about 150 ha
1997 Tammela - about 250 ha
The biggest of these was the Tuntsa forest fire in the northern partof Finland, and its effect on Nature can still be seen today. Thismap shows the location of the Tuntsa fire and figure 8 illustrates
how the ravaged forest now looks, 40 years after the event.
In the past, fire detection was done using towers with a cameraman
on duty (figure 4). Additionally, aircraft were used to monitor smokefrom fires. Nowadays, the temperature anomalies detected by
Earth observation satellites have made possible the detection offorest fires in large unpopulated areas. Today, FMI (the Finnish
Meteorological Institute) is providing forest fire warnings. Their firewarning system aims to raise public awareness about the terrain
during drought conditions, and the resulting fire hazard. FMI issues
a Forest Fire Index calculated according to the dryness of the terrain,
weather observations and assessment of their drought-calculation
model.
The FMI Drought Calculation Model
A calculation model is used to estimate the humus moisture content
of regions where partial clear-cutting has taken place to leave apatchwork of woodland and open terrain. Such areas are the mostflammable, as the open areas contain vegetation that dries quickly
adjacent to trees (which provide the main combustible material).
The model calculates the moisture content of the surface humus
for 3 cm and 6 cm thick layers. The surface moisture is calculatedon daily basis across the territory of Finland and the information
communicated daily to the FMI weather stations.

MSG satellite has a low viewing angle towards Finland, for which
reason it too cannot detect the fires. MODIS fire images (pixels)
could be used, but the best method is observation by aircraft, which
patrol areas where the fire probability index is high, once or twice
daily. The patrolling routes are outlined in white on figure 9.
I am a member of a flying club which is involved in these patrols,each of which is manned by a pilot, a fireman and a volunteer
observer (figure 10). It is important that there are several sets ofeyes to look out for possible fires which may be very small and hardto detect. The pilot needs to concentrate to flying and navigation.
When a possible fire has been detected, the fireman contacts
the local fire brigade using a Tetra phone. Sometimes the plane
continues patrolling the affected area to help direct firemen on the
ground to the correct area. Figure 11 shows an example of a forest
fire detected by one of these flying patrols.
Forest Fires and Lightning
I wrote an article for GEO Quarterly No 32 about lightning detection.
One of the causes of forest fires is lightning, and after writing thearticle I did some research work to study whether there was any
correlation between heavy lightning and forest fires. I can track
lightning using the Blitzortung detection system and MyBlitzortungsoftware.
http://www.blitzortung.org/Webpages/index.php

Readers interested in learning more of these topics should read thedetailed article in GEOQ 32, page 37.
My correlation studies involved using MyBlitzortung to track moving
lightning during the day and checking this information against fire
pixels from MODIS images to see if there was any correlation.
Figure 12 does seem to show some correlation in Bulgaria andSerbia.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the following for providing help and backgroundinformation for this article.
• David J Taylor, for extending the MODIS L1 Viewer for Firedetection and automated operations.
• The LSA team for excellent presentations during LSA week.
References
1 http://landsaf.meteo.pt/
2 http://cap-validator.appspot.com/validate#r

A substantial improvement in local accuracy is achieved by theapplication of the so-called grid method, whereby the measurement
is estimated on the basis of the value of weather variables such as
relative humidity, wind speed, air temperature, solar radiation andprecipitation levels in grid areas measuring 10 × 10 km.
Nationwide, some 20 automatic stations measure solar radiation,and it can also be calculated at 50 Synop stations which havea cloud measurement instrument. Another 150 stations record
temperature and humidity, while almost the whole of Finland is now
covered by weather radar. Areas that the rain radar does not cover
are served by stations provided with automatic rain gauges.
The output of the calculation model is the forest firewarning map, an example of which appears in figure 9.
As explained earlier, most fires are small local ones and theycannot be detected by satellites as in Mediterranean areas. The

34

December 2012www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Francis Breame - vf0123@btinternet.com

The Envi-Ham Project [1] has now finished, at least in its
original form. This article is taken from the report which I
wrote for the Project. It is intended that collated reports fromparticipating Envi-Ham stations will be issued in due course.

The Tutioune software [5] described by Esko Petäjä [6] wasideal for monitoring. Unfortunately, my setting up of it
coincided with the demise of Envisat (I don’t think the two arelinked), so it had little use.

Reception Setup

Data Usability

Since the Envi-Ham link budget is marginal at best withamateur equipment, and my garden layout forces a fairly
long cable run, I decided to use a relatively large dish (1.2m) and WF125 cable from the outset. This size of dish looks
a lot larger than one might imagine by comparison with the
80 cm version commonly used for EUMETCast reception, andimpressed the delivery driver when told that it was for TV
satellite reception (figure 1).

Having set up the receiving equipment, my main concern
was to improve the usability of the Envisat data received byEnvi-Ham. This was prompted by two observations:• Whilst the supplied visualisation program VISAT does
an excellent job of processing the data, it is very slow
to start and to load images. This is partly due to theneed to decompress very large files—those approaching
1 GB—before processing can commence.
• There is no way of telling from the filename thegeographic coverage of the data. Thus it is difficult toselect images of interest. Finding this out by opening in
VISAT is not practical on a routine basis, since it firstdecompresses the entire file. In fact, only the file header
needs to be read to determine the coverage.

Obviously, the alignment of a relatively large antenna,
combined with a fairly low-level downlink signal, requires
extreme care. I used a laptop with the production DVB-S
receiver next to the antenna to monitor the DDS (Data
Dissemination System) channel signal quality. The DDS is
the setup for rapid dissemination of the Envisat satellite’sdata using DVB-S over commercial satellites, very similar to
EUMETCast.
Note that cheap ‘Satfinder’ analogue meters, which monitor
the entire passband, are virtually useless for this application.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get a spectrum analyser until after
I had aligned the dish. It would have been ideal for thealignment.
I had to construct a simple adjuster which held the dishaccurately in elevation, as shown in figure 2. This allows fineadjustment via the threaded screws and holds the dish while
the clamping bolts are tightened. It could then have been
removed, but I left it in place for additional support. It would
also be useful for EUMETCast dish adjustment, although thisis not nearly as critical.
I also found it necessary to use a 20 dB head-end line
amplifier to compensate for the long cable run. This isclaimed to have a flat frequency response. Curiously, adifferent preamp, designed for this application in that it hada low-frequency roll-off to compensate for the lower cable
losses at those frequencies and avoid overloading, performed
less well in terms of error rates when it actually came to data
reception.
The waterproof housing for the preamplifiers is visible infigure 3, which also shows the feeder terminations. The one
with four cables leads to a motorised TV reception dish. I’ve
found readily-available blue 25 mm MDPE water pipe to bea cheap and effective means of running feeders undergroundin the garden. It provides both protection (having managed to
put a spade through them on more than one occasion) andallows them to be easily altered. Although rather snake-like,it can be fairly easily buried by cutting a slot with a spade—no need to dig trenches (figure 4).
Other than this, the station hardware and software was set
up with no problems, following the invaluable advice given
by David Taylor et al. in the GEO Quarterly [1,2,3]. I usedthe common 2-PC configuration (one for reception, one forprocessing). Both computers were used simultaneously for
EUMETCast reception.

Thus, I wrote two companion programs to improve thesituation, and made them available at no cost under the GNU
General Public License, together with comprehensive User
Guides, via my website at
http://www.elnath.org.uk

These were publicised in GEO Quarterly No 30 [6], and via
relevant Yahoo groups [7,8], which resulted in a number
of Envi-Ham stations using them for routine processing.
I am very grateful to the stations who provided me withsuggestions for facilities which I was able to incorporate into
the software to improve its usefulness. In particular, Esko
Petäjä incorporated it into his satellite downlink monitoring
configuration (which uses the Tutioune software), so thatcurrent thumbnails could be displayed for the latest image.
The two programs are intended to work together. The firstprogram, Envi-HamManager, is intended to be operational all
the time that DDS reception is running. Its main functions
are to:• Detect new files as they are received by DDS, as well as
certain file reception errors.
• Move files from the reception PC to the processing PC
where a 2-PC setup is in use.
• Delete received files which are not wanted.
• Automatically generate DIMAT and JPG files (both fullsize and thumbnails) from received files.
DIMAT is the native file format used by VISAT andwill therefore be loaded more quickly by VISAT. JPG
is the familiar image file format, which is used EnviHamBrowse for previewing.
• Show thumbnails of the latest received files.
• Monitor the DDS file reception log. Provide graphsof counts of files received successfully and failed forvarious periods.
• Delete old or unwanted files to keep disk space undercontrol.
• Report the status of its functions.
The second program, Envi-HamBrowse, is a browser whichdisplays, on a world map, the areas covered by the Envisat
files. Images of interest can then be selected and VISAT
started automatically to display them. Envi-HamBrowse cando this very quickly since it reads just enough of the file toFrancis Breame’s
website - http://www.elnath.org.uk
www.geo-web.org.uk

35

GEO Quarterly No 36

36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Figure 1 - The author’s 1.2 m dish used for Envi-Ham reception

Figure 2 - The dish adjuster

Figure 3 - The waterproof housing

Figure 4 - Making use of MDPE piping for underground feeders

Figure 5a - Reception Results

Figure 6 - A sample showing data failures

Figure 7 - Normal transponder spectrum

Figure 8 - Transponder spectrum showing possible failure cause

Francis Breame’s
website - http://www.elnath.org.uk
www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

determine its coverage area. It also includes a number offeatures to help with viewing and maintaining Envi-Ham files.
Its main functions are to:• Display the coverage area of files in the reception
directory, filtered according to date, file type, or image
type. Information about each image, including a
thumbnail, is also displayed as a popup.
• Display the coverage area of manually-selected files.
• Display the coverage area of the last file received.
• Launch the VISAT viewer for selected images.
• Display the associated JPG files for selected images,
which is quicker that launching VISAT.
• Generate DIMAT and JPG files for selected images,
where these were not generated automatically by EnviHamManager.
• Delete all files associated with selected images.
• Move chosen file types associated with selected images
to an archive directory, and delete the rest.
Envi-HamManager and Envi-HamBrowse are written in Perland Perl/Tk (which provides the GUI facilities). For thoseused to using Perl as a ‘glue’ scripting language, this may
seem a surprising choice. However, I’ve found Perl to be
extremely efficient, and most suitable for many applications,for the following principal reasons:• It comfortably handles the most complex applications.
• It is freely available for open-source projects.
• It has access to vast library resources.
• Its built-in pattern-matching facilities and contentaddressable storage (hashes) are most useful.
• It is possible to distribute an application as a selfcontained .exe file which includes all the necessary Perlruntime files. It is not therefore necessary to have Perlinstalled, or to bother about runtime or library versions.
• It is readily available for most platforms. EnviHamBrowse, and especially Envi-HamManager, havea lot of interactions with the operating system which
restrict them to running under Windows. However,the OS interfaces are clearly defined and it would nottherefore be difficult to port to Linux (indeed, the OS
interactions would be considerably easier than the
Windows version).
Now that the Envi-Ham project is regrettably at an end,
Envi-HamManager is obviously no longer relevant. However,Envi-HamBrowse is still most useful in looking at archived
data. For full details of the programs please refer to the user
guides, which are available from my website.
Reception Results
Figures 5a summarises the raw file reception results in termsof success and failure, as obtained by analysis of the DDS log
file over the period of 15 months between February 2011 andApril 2012. This is of interest, as Envi-Ham did not use theretransmission request feature of DDS.
Month 11-02
Month 11-03
Month 11-04
Month 11-05
Month 11-06
Month 11-07
Month 11-08
Month 11-09
Month 11-10
Month 11-11Month 11-12Month 12-01
Month 12-02
Month 12-03
Month 12-04

1377 files ok
1974 files ok1936 files ok
2053 files ok1916 files ok2409 files ok
2815 files ok
2472 files ok
2493 files ok
2047 files ok
1964 files ok2142 files ok2141 files ok
2533 files ok1903 files ok

165 failed
263 failed
297 failed
238 failed
236 failed
276 failed
286 failed
202 failed
255 failed
134 failed
91 failed
78 failed
264 failed
295 failed
83 failed

10.7%
11.8%
13.3%
10.4%
11.0%
10.3%
9.2%
7.6%
9.3%
6.1%
4.4%
3.5%
11.0%
10.4%
4.2%

Total

32175 files ok 3163 failed

9.0%

Figure 5b - Numerical breakdown of the figure 5a data

GEO Quarterly No 36

A further breakdown for each month by day is also available.
Figure 6 is a typical sample and shows data for April 2011.
This shows that the failure rate is typically clustered. Failure
spikes can often be attributed to reception equipment
problems, especially early on in the period. However, this did
not account for clusters such as we see in figure 6. I havespeculated that, since the Eutelsat transponder was sharedwith a number of relatively narrowband services, the uplink
power levels of others were not always controlled as wellas they might have been, resulting in a downlink deficit on
the DDS signal (which was marginal on amateur equipment
anyway). The transponder spectra in figures 7 and 8
illustrate this effect.
Figure 7 shows the transponder spectrum for the normalcase, illustrating the large number of services sharing
the transponder. Figure 8, on the other hand, shows the
spectrum on April 26, 2012, which corresponded with thehigher failure rate recorded for two days near the right offigure 6. The service to the immediate left of DDS has a very
noticeably increased level.
The Future
Given the apparent enthusiasm for Envi-Ham within theamateur community, I hope that it may be possible one day
to build on the experience gained and establish a similar
project using other data from present or future satellites. It
would also capitalise on the equipment acquired for EnviHam.
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to Stefano Badessi for creating the Envi-Ham
project in the first place, and to Francis Bell and David Taylor
who publicised its availability and provided much invaluableadvice on setting up a station [1,2,3]. In addition, thanks to
all the stations who used and provided suggestions for mysoftware.
System Details
Location
Period covered
Antenna

ReceiverReception PC

Processing PC

Central southern England
51.09° N, 0 80° W.
February 2011 - April 2012
Dedicated 1.2m dish at ground level
Invacom LNB40 0.3 dB LNB
Head-end line amplifier 20 dB~35 m WF125 cable
DVB World DVB-S
2-core AMD Athlon 64 X2 Toledo
2.2 GHz CPU, 2GB memory
Windows XP
6-core AMD Phenom II X6 1090T
3.2 GHz CPU, 8GB memory
Windows 7 Pro 64-bit

Links and References
1 Envi-Ham Project: Francis Bell, GEOQ 25, March 2010, page 12.
2 The Envisat Data Dissemination System: David Taylor, GEOQ 26,
June 2010, page 18.
3 David Taylor’s notes on setting up Envi-Ham reception at
http://www.satsignal.eu/wxsat/EnvisatDDS/
4 Tutioune software: http://www.vivadatv.org/page.php?p=tutioune-en
5 Tutioune: New Software to Analyse Your EUMETCast and Envi-Ham
Systems, Esko Petäjä, GEO Quarterly No 33, March 2012 page 15.
6 Envi-HamBrowse: A Front-End for Displaying Envi-Ham Images,
Francis Breame, GEOQ 30, June 2011, page 24.
7 Yahoo group: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/MSG-1
8 Yahoo group: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/GEO-Subscribers

Francis Breame’s
website - http://www.elnath.org.uk
www.geo-web.org.uk

37

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

A NASA Earth Observatory Report

When NASA’s Terra satellite passed overRussia’s Kamchatka Peninsula at local
noon on October 6, 2012, Shilveluch
Volcano was quiet. But by the time NASA’s
Aqua satellite flew over the area two hours
later, the volcano had erupted and sent aplume of ash over the Kamchatskiy Zaliv.
The plume travelled 90 kilometres southsoutheast where a change in wind direction
caused it to dog-leg towards the east. The
Kamchatka Volcanic Emergency Response
Team (KVERT) reported that the plume38

rose 3000 metres above sea level andtravelled 220 kilometres from the volcano’s
summit.
With a height of 3,283 metres, Shiveluch
ranks among the biggest and most active
volcanoes in Kamchatka. The mountain isa stratovolcano, composed of alternating
layers of hardened lava, compacted ash
and rocks ejected by previous eruptions.
The beige coloured expanse of rockon Shiveluch’s southern slopes is due

www.geo-web.org.uk

to avalanche debris resulting from an
explosive eruption in 1964 when part of its
southern flank collapsed. High-resolution
imagery shows very little vegetation withinthat avalanche zone.
Reference
Shiveluch Erupts - GEOQ 34, page 36

NASA image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz
LANCE MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Mike Stevens (G4CFZ)
I think the expression is: ‘it was good while it lasted’.
It was very good indeed, so different from the data we
receive daily from EUMETCast, very interesting, andabove all, with more detail. I am, of course referring toEnvisat and the Envi-Ham Project.
I have very specific regions of interest, mainly within
the Mediterranean Sea with all its islands shown ingreat detail, a truly interesting area, and one thatEnvisat covered extremely well (figure 1). One of myfavourites is the area around the Suez Canal region,
truly breathtaking and with lots of detail (figure 2).
Another area of particular interest was, of course, ourold friend the Aral Sea, which was described so well ina recent issue of GEO Quarterly [1].
So it was with great sadness that the satellite was ‘lost’
just as we, the amateur fraternity, were getting used tothe incoming data and the pictures that we developed. I
have to say that learning how to use the Visat software
took a bit of getting used to, but it was mastered in theend and created some stunning imagery.

Figure 1 - Envisat imaged Sicily and Malta on July 26, 2011

So where do we go from here? Those of us who received
the Envisat data stream now have spare capacity on
our systems: two DVB receivers and a one-metre dishwhich we can now use to our advantage. I have also
kept in circuit the twin outlet LNB that I installedwith the new dish I set up for use with EUMETCast to
increase the capability of the system.
My own experiences have been documented in the past
but for now I have dedicated everything to EUMETCast.
A slight movement of the satellite dish has increased
my signal strength from Eurobird 9 at 9°E, which I am
able to receive at 100% signal strength with 65% signal
quality. I now suffer no loss of signal during heavy rainsuch as we have had recently and, should we be invited
to receive any future data from ESA via Eutelsat, thenit’s just a case of realigning the dish: not so difficult
now that I have had the experience.

Figure 2 - Envisat imaged the Suez region on July 26, 2011

I have split up my system so that one of the DVB
receivers is bringing in the MSG-Rapid Scanning
Service, which runs continuously on one PC. The other
DVB receiver is dedicated to the MSG-2 standard cycleof data, feeding into a second PC which is shared with
Metop Manager, AVHRR Manager and Modis L1 Viewer.
But, once Metop-B data becomes available, I will be
reorganising the system again to even out the load on
the PCs.
With so much data available to be downloaded on
to our systems, we have the capability to receive
everything that is thrown at us without too many
problems. So don’t despair at the loss of Envisat. We
still have many exciting times ahead to look forward to,with data from Metop-B and perhaps also from NOAA’s
Suomi-NPP satellite to come in the future. Who knows?
Just hang in there. The best may be yet to come.

Figure 3 - Envisat imaged the Canary Islands on September 16, 2011

Reference
1 Syr Darya Control and the Northern Aral Sea Project
Les Hamilton - GEOQ 34, page 10
Figures 1-3 courtesy ESA
Figure 4 © EUMETSAT 2012

Figure 4 - A EUMETCast/MODIS segment of the Falkland Islands on October 5, 2012www.geo-web.org.uk

39

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Les Hamilton
Metop-B was launched from Baikonur in Kazakhstan, aboard a
Soyuz rocket, at 16:28 UT on September 17, 2012. Carrying a suiteof sophisticated instruments, Metop-B will ensure the continuity of
the weather and atmospheric monitoring service provided by its
predecessor Metop-A, which has now been circling Earth, 14 times
a day, since 2006.
The Metop satellites are Europe’s first operational polar orbiting
meteorological satellites; they make up the space segment of the
EUMETSAT Polar System, delivering data for modern weather
forecasting, as well as climate and environmental monitoring.
Metop-B carries a suite of eight instruments which monitor Earth’s
environment, plus four additional data dissemination packages. A
brief overview of the main features of each of these is summarised
below. The first three are heritage instruments provided by NOAA
to fly on Metop-B, and have been in operation aboard all theirsatellites since NOAA 15.
Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR/3)
The AVHRR/3 provides six channels of global visible and infrared
imagery twice a day at 1-km nadir resolution. These monitor
both reflected and radiated energy from land, sea, clouds andthe atmosphere for global monitoring of cloud cover, sea surface
temperature, ice, snow and vegetation cover characteristics.

Soyuz lifts off carrying Metop-B into orbit.
Image: ESA

High Resolution Infrared Radiation Sounder (HIRS/4)
HIRS/4 is a 20-channel radiometric sounder that measuresradiance, mainly in the infrared spectrum. Data from HIRS/4
are used in conjunction with data from the AMSU instruments
to calculate the atmosphere’s vertical temperature profileand pressure, from the Earth’s surface to an altitude of about
40 kilometres. HIRS/4 data is also used to determine ocean-surface
temperatures, total atmospheric ozone levels, precipitable water,
cloud height and coverage, and surface radiance.
Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit A1 and A2 (AMSU-A).
The AMSU instruments, which already fly aboard the American
NOAA satellites, measure scene radiance in 15 channels of the
microwave spectrum (23 to 90 GHz). These data are used inconjunction with the High-resolution Infrared Sounder (HIRS) to
calculate the global atmospheric temperature and humidity profiles
between the Earth’s surface and the upper stratosphere. The
data are used to provide precipitation and surface measurements
including snow cover, sea-ice concentration, and soil moisture.
Microwave Humidity Sounder (MHS)MHS was developed by EUMETSAT, and is a 5-channel, total
power, cross-track scanning radiometer operating in the 89 to
190 GHz range. MHS scans through the atmosphere to measure
the microwave radiation from the Earth in specific frequency bands.
Since humidity in the atmosphere attenuates microwave radiation,
MHS observations can be used to derive a detailed picture of
atmospheric humidity, with the different channels relating to different
altitudes in the atmosphere.
Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI)
IASI, developed by the French Space Agency CNES, is probably
the most advanced instrument carried on Metop-B and provides
meteorologists with data of unprecedented accuracy and resolution
on atmospheric temperature and humidity, with which to improve
weather prediction. IASI will also further understanding of theinteractions between atmospheric chemistry, climate and pollution.
Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT)
Developed by ESA, ASCAT is used to monitor winds over theoceans for weather forecasting and climate research. Winds create

The Metop-B Payload Module is lifted out of ESTEC’s
Large Space Simulator, after more than a month of testing.
Image: ESA

40

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

surface ripples over the sea (on a centimetre scale, as opposed
to waves) which modify its radar backscattering characteristics.
ASCAT uses radar to measure backscattered radiation from theoceans, and this information can be used to deduce actual windspeed and direction for weather forecasting.
Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME-2)
GOME-2 is another instrument developed by ESA, a nadir viewing
UV and visible spectrometer which measures the radiation
back-scattered from the atmosphere and reflected from Earth’s
surface in the UV and visible range between 240-790 nm. The
recorded spectra are used to derive a detailed picture of the total
atmospheric content of ozone and the vertical ozone profile in
the atmosphere. GOME-2 data will provide vertical profiles ofatmospheric ozone, nitrogen dioxide and sulphur dioxide, as well asother trace gases and levels of harmful ultraviolet light penetrating
the atmosphere.

Soyuz and Metop-B rolled out to the launch pad.
Photo: EUMETSATGNSS Receiver for Atmospheric Sounding (GRAS)
In full, the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Receiverfor Atmospheric Sounding (GRAS) is a new European receiverthat operates as an atmospheric sounder. GRAS uses radio
occultation to measure vertical profiles of atmospheric temperatureand humidity by tracking signals received from a constellation of
GPS navigation satellites while they are rising or setting behind theEarth’s atmosphere. By processing the navigation signals received
by GRAS, highly accurate profiles of atmospheric temperature,humidity and pressure can be derived every day.
Advanced Data Collection System (A-DCS)
A-DCS, provided by CNES, will provide worldwide in-situ
environmental data collection and Doppler-derived location service,with the objective of studying and protecting Earth’s environment.
A-DCS, also known as Argos, is an advanced version of the systempresently operated jointly by NOAA and CNES. Installation of thispackage aboard Metop makes EUMETSAT the third agency tomake use of this system.

The Metop-B satellite disappears from view as it is eased into therocket fairing in readiness for the launch on September 17, 2012.
Image: ESA

Space Environment Monitor (SEM-2)
SEM-2, provided by NOAA, is a charged-particle spectrometerthat makes measurements that determine the intensity of the
Earth’s radiation belts and of the flux of charged particles at thesatellite’s orbital altitude. It also provides information that can warn
us of solar wind occurrences that might impact upon long-range
communication or damage satellite circuitry.
Search And Rescue Processor (SARP-3)
SARP-3, provided by CNES, receives and processes emergency
signals from aircraft and ships in distress and determines the name,frequency and time of the signal. These data are then fed into the
SARR instrument for immediate transmission to Cospas-Sarsat(Search and Rescue Satellite) distress terminals on the ground.
Search And Rescue Repeater (SARR)
SARR, provided by the Canadian Department of Defence (through
NOAA), receives and down-links emergency signals from aircraft
and ships in distress and provides a down-link for data received
by the Search and Rescue Processor (SARP-3). SARR receives
distress beacon signals on three separate frequencies, thentranslates and retransmits them to Local User Terminals on the
ground. These terminals process the signals, determine the locationof the beacons, and forward the information to a rescue mission
control centre.
Brochure
Readers keen on learning more about Metop and its
instrumentation can download ESA’s attractive full-colour 16-pagebrochure about the Metop satellite series fromhttp://esamultimedia.esa.int/docs/BR-261_MetOp.pdf

Metop-B being readied for testing after arriving at the Baikonur launch facility.
Image: ESA

Acknowledgement
Thanks are due to ESA and EUMETSAT for making much of theabove information available through their respective websites.

www.geo-web.org.uk

41

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

December 2012

Les Hamilton
Sandy, the 18th named storm of 2012,
proved to be the largest Atlantic hurricane
ever recorded, its diameter of 1540 km
exceeding that of Hurricane Igor (1480 km
in 2010). The eight GOES images
reproduced here show Sandy’s progressfrom the Caribbean to the Great Lakes.
By October 28, Sandy had passed eastof Florida, after which point most storms
continue northeast to die out over open
waters. But not in this case. A combinationof high pressure over Greenland with apowerful winter storm advancing from thewest hauled Sandy back towards land andprevented its escape over the ocean. It
was widely forecast that Sandy would be
the worst storm ever to impinge on theeast coast, and so it proved to be, some
60 million people suffering in its wake.

New Jersey and the East Coast
Sandy weakened somewhat after battering
the Bahamas and was rated Category-1
when it made landfall in the USA, just eight
kilometres southwest of Atlantic City, lateon October 29. The storm unleashed chaos

all along the east coast, where it downed
trees and power lines throughout the state.
Most of Atlantic City’s 40,000 residents
had already evacuated their homes by thetime Sandy’s massive storm surge—whichcoincided with high tide—produced eight

15:45 UT on October 24, 2012

15:45 UT on October 28, 2012

15:15 UT on October 25, 2012

15:45 UT on October 29, 2012

15:45 UT on October 26, 2012

15:55 UT on October 30, 2012

15:45 UT on October 27, 2012

15:25 UT on October 31, 2012

The Caribbean
Sandy developed in the western Caribbean
Sea on October 22, and within two days
had intensified to a Category-1 hurricane.
As the storm tracked northwards it causeddevastation across a number of island
nations and claimed the lives of at least
52 people in Haiti, 11 in Cuba, two each in
the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic,
one in Jamaica and one in Puerto Rico.
Jamaica was first to feel the force ofSandy’s 125 kph winds, which left dozens offamilies homeless, ravaged the coffee andbanana crops, and caused an estimated$20 million in damage. The island of Haiti,
though not directly in Sandy’s path, washardest hit. Although the hurricane passed
to the west of the island, it still dumped
more than 50 centimetres of rain in under
24 hours. This downpour caused rivers
to overflow and generated mudslides thatengulfed homes, crops and roads: 70% of
the crops in the south of the island weredestroyed. Haiti has still to rehouse some
400,000 who became homeless following
the 2010 earthquake: now Sandy has added
a further 200,000 names to this list.
By the time Sandy crossed Cuba, it was
only marginally below Category-3 in strengthand devastated the island’s second-largest
city, Santiago de Cuba, where more than
30,000 homes lost their roofs. In addition,
1000 km2 of essential crops like banana,bean and sugar were ravaged. Most
seriously, almost one third of Cuba’s coffee
crop was destroyed just at the peak of theharvest season.
Six French tourists who had attended a
music festival on Dominica disappeared
after their boat was caught in Sandy’s pathas they travelled back to the nearby islandof Martinique, a journey which usually takes
no more than two hours. It seems inevitablethat all perished in the storm.

All the above GOES-13 (E) images courtesy NOAA

42

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Hardest by far was Staten Island, which was devastated beyond
recognition, and where 19 lives were lost. Most of these occurredin beachfront neighbourhoods exposed to the Atlantic Ocean,
where homes, built decades ago and not designed to withstand amajor storm, simply collapsed under the battering from the wind
and the weight of water that heaped up as high as their rooftops.
So complete was the devastation that only the foundations of thebuildings remained the following morning. Despite a mandatory
evacuation having been ordered before the storm hit, many
residents had remained in their homes believing that they could
handle whatever Sandy had in store for them. In the event, this was
not to be, and firefighters had to wade through rushing floodwaters
to the rescue of dozens of trapped residents living on the tip of thepeninsula.

Figure 1 - Flooding from Hurricane Sandy in Marblehead, Massachusetts.
Photo: Wikimedia / Brian Birke

In the flooded Rockaway Peninsula of Queens, a fire caused byelectrical faults was quickly spread from building to building by
the powerful winds, ultimately leading to the total destruction of
between 80 and 100 homes.

metre swells that inundated most of its streets. Amusement rides
that once stood on a pier in the coastal resort of Seaside Heights
were simply plucked from the ground and dumped into the ocean.
Torrential rain and high waves battered the Carolinas. In Fairfield,
Connecticut, some residents returned to their flooded homes inkayaks and canoes to inspect the damage. Ultimately, at least 24
states—from Florida to New England—suffered at the hands ofHurricane Sandy’s storm force winds which stretched far inland. A
week after the storm had passed, over a million people along theeast coast were still waiting for power to be restored to their homes.
New York
Fearing the worst, authorities ordered mandatory evacuation of
375 000 citizens living in low-lying areas of New York city, andmore than 76 evacuation shelters were set up to accommodate
them. All transport within New York was shut down the evening
Flooding in Manhatten’s East Village overnight on October 30.
Photo: Wikimedia / David Shankbone

In all, as many as 40 000 homes in New York were either destroyedor rendered uninhabitable by Hurricane Sandy. With winter starting
to bite, and thousands forced to live in wrecked homes without
electricity, the authorities were faced with a race against time todevise housing solutions for them, on an unprecedented scale.
The Great Lakes
So widespread was Sandy’s influence that weather buoys operated
by NOAA recorded wave heights exceeding seven metres onsouthern Lake Michigan and five metres over western Lake
Erie. Cargo shipping on the Great Lakes, which transports bulk
commodities such as iron ore, coal, limestone and grain, wasbrought to a standstill as Sandy churned up waves up to two stories
in height, forcing crews to take refuge in bays and harbours.
Figure 2 - An NYPD truck ploughs through floodwater on FDR Drive, NY.
Photo: Wikimedia / David Shankbone

before Sandy’s arrival, and all schools were closed. Foreseeingthat airports would not be able to operate, extra flights from New
York and Washington were added the day before Sandy struck in
preparation for inevitable cancellations the following day. When thehurricane’s storm surge arrived, it flooded scores of streets, tunnels
and subway lines in Lower Manhattan and devastated Staten
Island and Coney Island. The city’s lights went out and two million
consumers were without electricity for days on end. As the storm
lashed the city, waves topped the sea wall in the financial district ofManhattan, and cars floated down streets which turned into rivers.
The day following Sandy, the streets were littered with debris,
bridges were closed and seven subway tunnels under the East
River were flooded. With no transport in or out of the city, schools,
shops and businesses—including the New York stock exchange—
remained closed for a further two days, while more than thirteen
thousand airline flights were cancelled.

Sandy swept this boat on to the tracks of Metro-North’s Ossining Station
Photo: Metropolitan Transportation Authority of the State of New Yorkwww.geo-web.org.uk

43

GEO Quarterly No 36

The Group for Earth Observation

Hello Les,I was reading from the last GEO Quarterly about Management
Group worries about the decrease of GEO’s membership. The
reason for me is very clear. For any company or association there
is always the need to have something new going on. Companies
have to keep developing new products. If a new development is notpresent, it will die in couple if years.

December 2012

Groups could be, for example,• Computers , EUMETCast receiving units, etc.
• Direct receiving activities.
• New from ESA activities• New From EUMETCast activities• Software• Issues from amateur satellite observation sensors
and so on,

In GEO, I can see that there is a great history with APT,
EUMETCast and Envisat. But APT will be soon history, EUMETCast
is now widely known and Envisat is dead.
My proposal is the following
Establishing activity groups with a responsible leader for eachgroup. The group responsibility is to develop activities in its area
and also to report about them in GEO Quarterly in a regular way(just like computer corner was, in the past). This will also attract
new articles. Additionally everybody sees that something is goingon.

PS: My daily work is in R&D, to develop new products and also
encourage organisations and capable individuals to be moreinnovative. One specific task is how to raise interest and to expand
the number of people in the interest group.
This hobby is so interesting that it should not be any problem toincrease membership if the right methods are used..
Esko Petäjä, Finland.

continued from page 29

Next to the Raw Images tab is another tab marked Derived Images.
click on that box and an amazing full-colour image willappear on screen. If you now right-click on this image, a listof options appears: you can use these to enhance the image.
Options include:
Boundaries
Grid
North Pole
Remap Region (with other options included)
RGB Setting
Thermal LUT
Vis Channel brightness (with more options included)
Zoom in and out
At the very bottom if the list is Save with correction, the option
you would normally use to save any image you may wantto keep for viewing at a later date. This option geometricallycorrects the image. The Derived Images tab also provides a rowof buttons marked RGB-521, User RGB, Vegetation, Air Mass and Ashand Dust, all basically self explanatory (but you may need to
upgrade to get all the user information).
So there you have it: an excellent piece of software fromDavid Taylor. If you need to investigate more, consult
David’s website where he has a lot of excellent information
concerning all his software, with lots of extras.
A full size MODIS image from Terra, acquired via EUMETCast
on August 5, 2012 is reproduced on the back cover of thisissue. Most of south and central Europe basks in sunshine,
though thunderstorms can be seen brewing over the BlackSea and the northern Caucuses.
My thanks to David Taylor for some helpful information inwriting this article.
Happy weather watch from Portland.

44

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

GEO Quarterly No 36

Francis Bell and Les Hamilton
Readers may be interested in this recent MODIS image of Hurricane Nadine. The overlap with GEO is the name
‘Nadine’, because the company secretary of GEO Ltd. is Nadine Bell, who has looked after the business and legal side ofour company since its inception nine years ago. A fitting tribute for such commitment to have hurricane named after one!
On a more serious note, though, the effects of this hurricane caused serious damage and flooding in the north of the UK
on September 23-24, 2012. Some of our UK readers will doubtless have experienced this directly.

Nadine formed as a tropical depression southof the Azores on September 11, and within 24
hours had strengthened into a tropical storm,
one of the most persistent ever recorded in the
Atlantic Ocean. During the 23 days Nadine spent
weaving her erratic dance south of the Azores
she intermittently attained Category-1 hurricane
status, with peak winds of 140 kph. Nadine also
became the fifth longest-lived tropical cyclone
in the Atlantic Ocean, a record held by the
San Ciriaco Hurricane as long ago as 1899, andwhich endured for 28 days. By comparison, theaverage life of a tropical cyclone is only six days.
Nadine finally petered out on October 4.

Nadine’s track across the Atlantic. Red dotsshow when Nadine gained hurricane status
Credit: Supportstorm using Wikipedia:WikiProject
Tropical cyclones/Tracks

During its lifetime, Nadine spawned a deep
secondary depression, dubbed Child of
Nadine, which tracked across the UK during
September 23-26, subjecting the north andeast of England in particular to gale force
winds and torrential rain. Ravensworth in North
Yorkshire experienced 131 mm of rain in lessthan 72 hours, almost three times what would be
expected for the entire month of September. The
Met Office issued more than 50 flood warnings,
and many homes were deluged by floodwater,while road and rail services were severely
disrupted. Child of Nadine was the deepest
depression to hit north-east England since 1981.
As for the Azores, although the threat wasalways there, Nadine never quite made landfall.
On September 17, Nadine started to drift
northeast towards the islands but veered to thesoutheast before reaching them, though large
ocean swells and storm force gusts of up to
74 kph were recorded on Flores.

Hurricane Nadine as imaged by NASA’s Aqua satellite on September 30, 2012
NASA image courtesy LANCE MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC

www.geo-web.org.uk

45

GEO Quarterly No 36

EUMETCast On-Line
Registration Guide
If you require to register as a first-time user for
any of the free EUMETCast data streams suchas MSG, NOAA AVHRR, Metop etc., or needto renew an existing subscription, this must be
done on-line.
GEO has produced a step-by-step guide to theentire process at
http://www.geo-web.org.uk/eumreg.html
This guide also contains a direct link to theofficial EUMETCast on-line registration form,
which can otherwise prove somewhat tricky tolocate.

GEO Helplines

The Group for Earth Observation

Weather Satellite Reports
If there is a single Internet Forum that isrelevant to all weather satellite enthusiasts,
it must surely be Douglas Deans’ Weather
Satellite reports.
Here you will find every conceivable type of
information about weather satellites, whether
polar or geostationary, APT, HRPT, LRIT orwhatever.
Absolutely everything is covered, and theinformation is updated every week. Special
additional bulletins may be issued if an
important change takes place mid week.

Douglas Deans

You can read the bulletins from this URL

Dunblane, Perthshire, SCOTLAND.

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/
weather-satellite-reports/
or, even better, elect to have the reports sent
to you by email every Monday.

All aspects of weather satellites from APT,
HRPT to Meteosat-9 DVB/EUMETCast
systems.
• telephone:(01786) 82 28 28• e-mail: dsdeans@tiscali.co.uk
John Tellick
Surbiton, Surrey, ENGLAND.
Meteosat-9 advice: registering for the various
MSG services, hardware and software
installation and troubleshooting. John will
also field general queries about any aspect ofreceiving weather satellite transmissions.
• telephone: (0208) 390 3315
• e-mail: info@geo-web.org.uk
Geoff Morris GW3ATZ
Shotton, Flintshire, NE WALES.
Geoff has lots of experience with aerial,coax,connectors, mounting hardware etc. andhas also done a lot of work with the orbiting
satellites. Geoff has been a EUMETCast
Meteosat-9 user for some time and is familiar
with David Taylor’s MSG software. He
should be able to share his experiences with
newcomers to this branch of the hobby.
• Tel: (01244) 818252• e-mail: gw3atz@btopenworld.com
Mike Stevens
Portland, Dorset, England.
Advice and assistance offered on EUMETCast(MSG and Metop) and Envi-Ham (including
ESA’s Visat software for decoding the images).
• email: mike1g4cfz@msn.com
Guy Martin G8NFU
Biggin Hill NW Kent, ENGLAND
Guy is prepared to advise anyone who wishing
to receive MSG/Metop using Windows 2000 or
XP. Can also help with networking and ADSL
router setup.
• gmartin@electroweb.co.uk
Hector Cintron
San Juan, Puerto Rico, USA
Hector is prepared to field enquiries on HRPT,
APT, EMWIN and NOAAPORT• Phone: 787-774-8657• e-mail: n1tkk@hwic.net
Email contact can of course be made at any
time, but we would ask you to respect privacy
by restricting telephone contact to the period
7.00-9.00 pm in the evenings.

46

Internet Discussion Groups
There are a numerous Internet-based
discussion groups available to weather satellite
enthusiasts. You can join any of these by
sending an e-mail to the appropriate address,
with a request to subscribe. Indeed, a blanke-mail containing the word ‘subscribe’ in its
Subject line is all that is required. Some of themore useful groups and their contact addresses
are listed below.
APT Decoder
This is a group where users of Patrik Tast’s
APTDecoder can share information andproblems.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/
group/APTDecoder/
GEO-Subscribers
This is GEO’s own group, where members can
exchange information and post queries relating
to any aspect related to weather satellite
reception (hardware, software, antennas etc),
Earth observation satellites and any GEOrelated matter.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/
group/GEO-Subscribers/
Satsignal
An end-user self help group for users ofDavid Taylor’s Satellite Software Tools(SatSignal, WXtrack, GeoSatSignal, HRPT
Reader, GroundMap, MSG Data Manager,
AVHRR?Manager and the ATOVS?Reader).
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/
group/SatSignal/
MSG-1
A forum dedicated to Meteosat Second
Generation (MSG), where members share
information about the EUMETCast reception
hardware and software.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/
group/MSG-1/

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012

Copy Deadline for
GEO Quarterly No 37 is
Sunday, February 3
The Editor is always delighted to receive
articles and images for inclusion in
GEO Quarterly. These can relate to any
aspect of Earth Imaging, especially• Technical articles concerning relevant
hardware and software• Construction projects• Weather satellite images• Reports on weather phenomena• Descriptions of readers’ satellite imaging
stations• Activities from overseas readers• Letters to the Editor• Problems and Queries for our experts toanswerContributions should of course be original
and, where possible, should be submitted
to the editor in electronic format (e-mailattachment, CD, DVD). But of course, wewould also accept handwritten or typed copy.
Please note, however, that major articles
which contain large numbers of satellite
images, photographs or other illustrations
should be submitted as early as possible,
so that they can be prepared and made up
into pages in time for publication.
Images and Diagrams
Images can be accepted in any of the major
bitmap formats: JPG, BMP, GIF, TIFF etc.
Images in both monochrome and colour are
welcomed. Line drawings and diagrams are
preferred in WMF, EPS or postscript formats.
We can also scan original photographs,
negatives and slides.
Gridding, Overlays and Captions
Please note that readers’ satellite images
should be provided without added grid lines,
country outlines or captions unless these areconsidered essential for illustrative purposes
within an article.
If your article submission contains embedded
images and diagrams, please note that you
must also submit copies of the original
images in one of the formats describedabove: these are essential for page make-up
purposes.
Submission of Copy
Materials for publication should be sent to
the editor,
Les Hamilton
8 Deeside Place
Aberdeen AB15 7PW
ScotlandThe most efficient way to do this is by email
attachments to the following address
geoeditor@geo-web.org.uk
Particularly large attachments (8 MB andabove) can be transmitted via YouSendIt
www.yousendit.com_________________________
And finally . . .
if you do have material ready for the next
issue of GEO Quarterly, please submit it
as soon as it is ready—do not wait till thedeadline above: this will simply create an
editorial log-jam and delay publication.

December 2012

The Group for Earth Observation

www.geo-web.org.uk

GEO Quarterly No 36

47

GEO Quarterly No 36

48

The Group for Earth Observation

www.geo-web.org.uk

December 2012