Artemis assists emergency services to fight Portuguese fires

Fire fighters tackling the blazes that have ravaged Portugal are doing so with
the aid of a satellite data-link.

For the first time, ESA’s satellite Artemis has been used to support an
emergency request under the International Charter on "Space and Major Disasters".

Portugal’s civil protection unit (SNPC) was able to receive information and
groups of images that showed the scope of the fires. The data, transmitted from
ESA’s Earth observation satellite, Envisat, via the Artemis data-relay
spacecraft in geostationary orbit, were received in near real-time at the ESA
data processing centre, located at ESRIN near Rome.

On 4 August ESA’s Earthwatching service requested a full resolution MERIS
(Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer) acquisition over the areas in Portugal
affected by the fire. The Portuguese Civil Protection then requested emergency
planning on 6 August, through the Charter. The first acquisition was made via
Artemis on 7 August.

The Charter is an international collaboration to combine international satellite
resources to assist participating rescue authorities and other civil protection
agencies. ESA participates in the Charter together with Argentina , Canada,
France, India and USA.

In this image burnt areas appear as very dark patches to the north-east of
Lisbon, close to the centre of the land part of the image, along the Tagus
River. Lisbon itself is visible south of the large whitish area at the mouth of
the Tagus. The image covers all of Portugal plus part of Spain’s Galicia region.

Use of Artemis for data relay offers Earth observation missions greater
visibility and reduces delays in image reception. Artemis has been providing a
data relay service to Envisat and the French national mission SPOT 4 since March
of this year.

Artemis is ESA’s latest telecommunications satellite, designed to qualify new
space technologies and promote new services. It also carries payloads for land
mobile communications and a navigation payload as an element of the European
Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS).

Related articles

* Artemis relays first images for Envisat
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM29Q2A6BD_index_0.html

The Charter

* Argentina’s CONAE joins the International Disaster Charter
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM0XKXO4HD_index_0.html

* Satellite ally in the battle against floods
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/GGGWC7WTGEC_index_0.html

* A single telephone line to mobilise space facilities for natural disaster
management
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/GGGRBE1UGEC_index_0.html

Related links

* Artemis website
http://www.esa.int/artemislaunch

* Envisat website
http://www.esa.int/envisat

* Disaster Charter
http://www.disasterscharter.org/

* Earth Watching
http://earth.esa.int/ew/

* Portuguese Civil Protection
http://www.snpc.pt/

IMAGE CAPTIONS:

[Image 1:
http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEMQZXYO4HD_index_1.html]
Fire fighters tackling the blazes that have ravaged Portugal are doing so with
the aid of a satellite data-link.

[Image 2:
http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEMQZXYO4HD_index_1.html#subhead1]
In this image burnt areas appear as very dark patches to the north east of
Lisbon, close to the centre of the land part of the image, along the Tagus
River. Lisbon itself is visible south of the large whitish area at the mouth of
the Tagus. The image covers all of Portugal plus part of Spain’s Galicia region.

[Image 3:
http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEMQZXYO4HD_index_1.html#subhead2]
Envisat communicates Artemis and the ESRIN data-procesing centre via Ka-band.
Credits: ESA 2003