About ERS Window on the World Everyday the fine balance of our planet s natural ecological system is gradually being altered by many of the normal activities associated with modern daily life that we all take for granted. Today, therefore, we have an urgent need to monitor and understand both man-made and natural changes to our atmosphere, land and the oceans in every part of the world. In many cases satellites are the only way to obtain suitable data.
Satellites orbiting the Earth can gather comprehensive information.
But visual systems that rely on daylight and clear conditions to see the surface have a distinct disadvantage they cease to function when it is cloudy or at night. It works by bouncing microwaves off the Earth s surface and measuring the reflected radiation. A SAR also has five different modes of operation, allowing a variety of image types and giving us a new and permanently open window on the world. It was followed by a second on ERS-2 in 1995. At the time the two ERS satellites were the most sophisticated Earth observation spacecraft ever developed and launched in Europe.