About Proba-V
Proba-V is a miniaturised ESA satellite tasked with a full-scale mission: to map land cover and vegetation growth across the entire planet every two days.
| Proba-V facts and figures | |
| Launch date: | 02:06 GMT on 7 May 2013 (23:06 local time 6 May; 04:06 CEST 7 May) |
| Mass: | 140 kg |
| Orbit: | Sun-synchronous polar orbit, 820 km altitude, crossing the equator every morning between 10:30 and 11:00 local time |
| Instrument: | New version of the Vegetation imager previously flown on the Spot satellites |
| Guest technology payloads: | Gallium nitride amplifier incorporated in communication subsystem; Energetic Particle Telescope; SATRAM radiation monitor, ADS-B aircraft signal detector; fibre optic photonics experiment |
| Prime contractor: | QinetiQ Space Belgium |
| Payload developer: | OIP Sensor Systems |
| Ground segment: | Satellite’s mission control centre in Redu, Belgium complemented by a ground station for data reception, and a processing and archiving centre at VITO in Belgium. The exploitation phase of Proba-V will be managed by ESA from ESRIN, ESA’s Earth observation centre in Italy. |
| Launcher: | Vega |
