By 1983, when this calendar was produced, two Meteosat weather satellites were in orbit: Meteosat-1, launched 23 November 1977, and Meteosat-2, launched 19 June 1981. The poster, in German, shows Meteosat data products in visible, infrared and water vapour wavelengths.
Placed in geostationary orbit at 0 degrees longitude, Meteosat-1 provided a permanent field of view over most of Europe, the whole of Africa, the Middle East and the eastern half of South America - in total over 100 countries.
Image data was transmitted to the Data Acquisition, Telemetry, and Tracking Station, Odenwald, Germany, for relay to the Meteosat Ground Computer System and Meteosat Operations Control centre at ESA's European Space Operations Centre (ESOC).
The first-generation Meteosats provided data 24 hours a day from the three spectral channels of the main instrument; the Meteosat Visible and Infrared Imager (MVIRI), every 30 minutes.
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