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Image: Stretches of land across New South Wales, Australia, have been hit with torrential rain leading to record-breaking floods. Data from the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission are being used to map flooded areas to help relief efforts.

Image: Lunar cave explorer

Data from ESA’s Gaia star mapping satellite have revealed tantalising evidence that the nearest star cluster to the Sun is being disrupted by the gravitational influence of a massive but unseen structure in our galaxy.

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As the climate crisis continues to impact life on Earth, ESA is using data beamed to the ground from satellites to boost scientists’ understanding of the evolving environment and help people cut planet-warming emissions.

These activities are coordinated by the ESA Climate Office, a focal point for climate-related projects that is based at the agency’s European Centre for Space Applications and Telecommunications in the UK.

In this video, Paul Fisher, knowledge transfer and communications manager at the Climate Office, explains the role of space in tackling climate change.

Since the pre-industrial era, Earth’s temperature has risen by around 1°C. This is linked to many other changes, including rising sea-levels and receding glaciers.

The Climate Office delivers the ESA Climate Change Initiative, a research programme that transforms satellite data into global climate observations that are increasing understanding of these long-term trends.

Data from the initiative is enabling climate modellers to better predict future changes to the polar ice sheets, oceans and forests as the world continues to heat up.

Governments and organisations can use these forecasts to make decisions that will help to limit global warming and enable society to adapt to its effects.

Urban greenery can improve air quality and promote wellbeing. ESA is working with municipal authorities to identify how space can help to create sustainable cities in which people are healthier, happier and more productive.

Discover how space can help to boost the physical and mental health of city dwellers in an hour-long webinar to be held on 25 March.

• Mass is constantly being redistributed around our planet, as Earth’s atmosphere, oceans and other bodies of water on and under the surface melt, shift and stir.
• This mass redistribution alters Earth’s centre of gravity, which in turn speeds up and slows down the planet's spin – and so the length of the day – as well as changing the orientation of its 'spin axis'.
• These changes to Earth’s spin and orientation occur over relatively short timescales of days and weeks, and threaten communication between ground stations and missions in orbit and across the Solar System.
• ESA is working on its own algorithm to predict Earth’s orientation with extreme accuracy. Early tests show the new ESA algorithm outperforms those being used today from external providers, marking an important step in ensuring Europe’s independent access to space.

Mars has lost most of its once plentiful water, with small amounts remaining in the planet’s atmosphere. ESA’s Mars Express now reveals more about where this water has gone, showing that its escape to space is accelerated by dust storms and the planet’s proximity to the Sun, and suggesting that some water may have retreated underground.

Clustered at the edge of the Crocodile River in Mpumalanga Province, South Africa, stand thousands of farms and small holdings growing fresh fruit and sugar cane. Water to irrigate the crops is taken from the river, but this slows its flow rate and leaves less for those downstream.

Whilst demand for fresh water is increasing, water sources are becoming depleted and polluted. With the Global Water Partnership believing that sustainable development will not be achieved without a water secure world, can we look to space to solve our water security problems on Earth?

Week in images: 15 - 19 March 2021

Discover our week through the lens

The European Space Agency is currently looking for a new Director of Earth Observation Programmes, to join its Executive Board and support the Director General, with responsibility for relevant ESA programmes and overall objectives.

Flight passengers will soon be able to connect to their families and colleagues on Earth via low-orbit telecommunications satellites.

Ahead of the International Day of Forests, the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over part of the Amazon rainforest in the Amazonas – the largest state in Brazil.

ESA’s Lunar Pathfinder mission to the Moon will carry an advanced satellite navigation receiver, in order to perform the first ever satnav positioning fix in lunar orbit. This experimental payload marks a preliminary step in an ambitious ESA plan to expand reliable satnav coverage – as well as communication links – to explorers around and ultimately on the Moon during this decade.

Image: ESA's technical heart

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Born in Rouen, France, aerospace engineer and commercial pilot Thomas Pesquet was selected for ESA’s Astronaut Corps in 2009. He was launched on his first flight to the International Space Station in November 2016, remaining in space until June 2017 as part of his Proxima mission. He will soon be launched for on his second long-duration mission to the International Space Station called Alpha. Thomas has been training with the Station’s international partners for the new mission, including learning about the Crew Dragon, he will be the first ESA astronaut to fly on this new commercial spacecraft.

This A&B Roll highlights Thomas Pesquet’s early training with the European Astronaut Corps, his first spaceflight, and preparations for the upcoming Alpha mission, with soundbites in English and French.

Image: Learning lessons from the past on space debris

With 26 satellites in orbit and more than two billion receivers in use, Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation system has made a massive impact. But our continent has another satnav system that has been providing safety-of-life services for ten years now – chances are that you’ve benefited from it without noticing.

Fluctuations in the carbon-rich biomass held within the world’s forests can contribute to, or slow, climate change. A series of new maps of above ground biomass, generated using space observations, is set to help our understanding of global carbon cycling and support forest management, emissions reduction and sustainable development policy goals.

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ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet will serve as commander of the International Space Station towards the end of his second mission, called Alpha, currently slated to begin on 22 April this year. The announcement was made during today’s  press briefing.

Thomas will be the fourth European to hold the post of commander, after ESA astronauts Frank De Winne, Alexander Gerst and Luca Parmitano. During the briefing, Thomas remarked how three back-to-back European commanders underscores the growing role of Europe in space exploration and is a testament to the hard work of ESA colleagues.

‘I am unbelievably humbled and honoured’, said Thomas.  

Thomas will be the first ESA astronaut to fly on a SpaceX Crew Dragon launching on a Falcon 9 rocket from Florida, USA. He will accompany NASA astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Akihiko Hoshide.

During his six-month Alpha mission, Thomas will continue the programme of research that often spans multiple missions and a wide range of scientific disciplines spanning materials science and radiation to educational activities.

The end of Thomas six-month stay on board will overlap with the start of German ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer’s first mission to the Space Station, called Cosmic Kiss, which will be followed by Samantha Cristoforetti’s second tenure in space, marking three back-to-back missions for ESA astronauts.

Follow Thomas Pesquet and his Alpha mission via thomaspesquet.esa.int.