Cryosat Mission / ESA TV Exchanges / 24-05-2005

The next transmission of the ESA TV Service will be:

24-May-05 09:15 – 09:30 GMT

Cryosat Mission

ESA TV Exchanges

Background information on the transmission:

Replay I: 24 May 14:30-14:45 GMT

Replay II: 28 May 10:30-10:45 GMT

ESA’s Cryosat satellite is a radar altimetry mission to observe polar regions and continental glaciers. Its aim is to determine any changes in the thickness of the Earth’s continental ice sheets and marine sea ice cover.

Ice sheets have a central role in the global climate. Although thousands of kilometres away from most populated regions, the ice can determine the climate for example in Europe, Asia and America by influencing the circulation of water in the oceans. The Arctic is the region on Earth where the greatest changes in ice cover due to global warming are predicted.

Cryosat will help to determine whether the polar ice sheets are actually shrinking or not, and at which rate. The satellite will be launched on a Rockot vehicle from Plessetsk in Russia in autumn 2005.

Today’s Exchnage provides the footage to outline the case for the Cryosat mission, featuring soundbites by Pr. Duncan Wingham from University College London, who proposed the mission in 1997/98 and today leads an international team of scientists to evaluate its data.

The script will be online as a PDF file under http://television.esa.int/photos/EbS39830.pdf

This ESA TV Exchanges feed is transmitted by the European Commission’s “Europe by Satellite” (EbS) service. You can find the complete transmission schedule and download scripts and shot lists, also for ESA TV items, from the EbS Web site at http://europa.eu.int/comm/ebs/schedule.cfm

More background information can be found on http://www.esa.int/esaLP/cryosat.html.

Transmission details:EUTELSAT HOT BIRD at 13° East (DVB/MPEG-2)

Horizontal, F=12,476 MHz (MCPC, Europe by Satellite)

SR=27,500 MS/sec, FEC=3/4

For further information, visit our website at http://television.esa.int. For other enquires, contact Claus Habfast, Tel +31 71 565 3838, Fax +31 71 565 6340, e-mail claus.habfast@esa.int.

With kind regards

ESA TV Service