ESA - Sentinel-3 - Archive

ESA title

The mission

Carrying a suite of cutting-edge instruments, Copernicus Sentinel-3 measures systematically Earth’s oceans, land, ice and atmosphere to monitor and understand large-scale global dynamics. It provides essential information in near-real time for ocean and weather forecasting.

The launch

Date: Sentinel-3A on 16 February 2016
Sentinel-3B on 25 April 2018
Sentinel-3C on 15 September 2026
Site: Sentinel-3A and -B from Plesetsk Cosmodrome, Russia
Sentinel-3C from Europe's Spaceport, French Guiana
Launcher: Sentinel-3A and -B on Rockot
Sentinel-3C on Vega-C

4 instruments
7 years mission life
815 km orbit altitude

Sentinel-3

Vega-C takes FLEX and Sentinel-3C into orbit

FLEX and Sentinel-3C launched

15/09/2026 7995 views 53 likes

FLEX and Sentinel-3C ready for launch

FLEX and Sentinel-3C ready for liftoff on Vega-C

14/09/2026 2141 views 27 likes

Teams at ESOC during ESA’s FLEX and Copernicus Sentinel-3C launch and early orbit (LEOP) simulations

Enabling & Support

A team of teams like never before: rehearsing a unique laun…

11/09/2026 1787 views 41 likes

Vega-C fairing opens to reveal Sentinel-3C and FLEX

Watch: FLEX and Sentinel-3C launch on Vega-C

09/09/2026 7576 views 50 likes

Smoke plume from Greek wildfires seen by Sentinel-3

How Sentinel-3 tracks climate change

04/09/2026 2231 views 40 likes

FLEX and Sentinel-3C being sealed from view

FLEX and Sentinel-3C sealed within Vega-C fairing

02/09/2026 2563 views 51 likes

Two contrasting views of the countryside around the Serbian capital, Belgrade, captured on 8 August 2026.

Sentinel-3 provides faster data for Europe fires

18/08/2026 1391 views 14 likes

FLEX and Sentinel-3 head to launch site

FLEX and Sentinel-3C arrive at Europe’s Spaceport

16/07/2026 2321 views 43 likes

El Niño 2026 begins

Pacific warming signals El Niño has stirred

15/06/2026 15305 views 62 likes

Desert locust

Turning data from space into action for Earth

22/04/2026 2979 views 33 likes

FLEX, Sentinel-3C and MTG-I2 on show at TAS cleanrooms

Three ESA-built satellites on show in France

16/04/2026 4690 views 59 likes

Sea state

Satellites reveal the power of ocean swell

08/10/2025 7692 views 63 likes

Iberian fires August 2025

Iberian wildfires seen from space

20/08/2025 14294 views 68 likes

Trends in Arctic sea ice thickness from 2011–2025

Sea ice lows high on the agenda

24/06/2025 2350 views 23 likes

Global sea surface temperature

Sea surface warming faster than expected

17/04/2025 9266 views 64 likes

Protecting areas of the Atlantic Ocean from human activity

Protecting ocean biodiversity with satellite data

15/04/2025 2581 views 31 likes

Adriatic Bloom

How marine heatwaves impact phytoplankton and ocean health

31/10/2024 2779 views 36 likes

Arctic diatoms

Will climate change turn the Arctic green?

18/06/2024 3913 views 10 likes

Smoke from fires in Canada

Canada’s wildfire season begins

16/05/2024 3111 views 14 likes

Full Earth disc from the Meteosat Third Generation Imager

10 ways Earth is interconnected

22/04/2024 6084 views 19 likes

Sentinel-5P detected methane plumes

Trio of Sentinel satellites map methane super-emitters

20/09/2023 40853 views 155 likes

Worldwide fires from ESA’s World Fire Atlas

Counting wildfires across the globe

03/08/2023 50969 views 107 likes

Heatwave across Europe

Europe braces for sweltering July

13/07/2023 112186 views 213 likes

Sea-surface temperature January to mid-May 2023

Our oceans are in hot water

17/05/2023 11763 views 107 likes

France and Spain land-surface temperature

Feeling the heat from space

20/07/2022 14442 views 139 likes

Greenland ice sheet melt

Historic Greenland ice sheet rainfall unravelled

25/05/2022 9086 views 113 likes

A-68A’s position on 17 December

Mega iceberg released 152 billion tonnes of freshwater

20/01/2022 11980 views 82 likes

Baltic Sea from Copernicus Sentinel-3

New satellite data techniques reveal coastal sea-level rise

07/07/2021 16598 views 113 likes

Ocean acidification

Satellites highlight a 30-year rise in ocean acidification

21/04/2021 8951 views 93 likes

Mount Etna smoke plumes

Satellites monitor Mount Etna’s unpredictable behaviour

08/04/2021 19697 views 102 likes

A-68A and A-68G

Is this the end of the A-68A iceberg?

03/02/2021 20827 views 102 likes

Wetlands

Earth observation vital in monitoring wetland waters

02/02/2021 6679 views 89 likes

Area burned by fire in August 2019

New long-term dataset to analyse global fire trends

26/01/2021 7813 views 70 likes

A-68A iceberg loses chunk of ice

Giant A-68A iceberg loses chunk of ice

18/12/2020 12081 views 127 likes

Start of Vendée Globe 2020

Copernicus satellites keep eyes on icebergs for Vendée Globe

02/12/2020 5368 views 51 likes

Between fire and hurricane

US West Coast on fire

18/09/2020 8918 views 84 likes

Industrial emissions of carbon dioxide fuel our warming climate

Providing the facts to help Europe achieve 55%

16/09/2020 4248 views 48 likes

Captured on 11 August by the Copernicus Sentinel-3 mission, this image shows Eureka in the Canadian territory of Nunavut.

Monitoring the Arctic heatwave

27/08/2020 7378 views 115 likes

Working on Copernicus Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich

Building satellites amid COVID-19

04/05/2020 4645 views 53 likes

Burned area near Chernobyl site

Mapping Chernobyl fires from space

16/04/2020 20907 views 90 likes

Water management key for sustainable agriculture

Satellites and machine learning for water management

09/04/2020 11012 views 87 likes

Smoke over New South Wales, Australia, from Copernicus Sentinel-3

Australia: like a furnace

09/01/2020 15040 views 140 likes

Fires around the world

Is Earth on fire?

25/10/2019 24990 views 110 likes

Sea roughness key to carbon flux

Can oceans turn the tide on the climate crisis?

08/10/2019 12038 views 217 likes

Wildfires in Brazil

Fires ravage the Amazon

27/08/2019 17570 views 146 likes

Sargassum in Guadeloupe

Washed up: Sargassum blankets beaches

30/07/2019 13311 views 127 likes

Ice streams named

Antarctic glaciers named after satellites

07/06/2019 5973 views 60 likes

Greenland snow grain and albedo

Snow grain size – it matters

29/05/2019 7477 views 89 likes

Floods imaged by Copernicus Sentinel-1

Copernicus Sentinel-1 maps floods in wake of Idai

20/03/2019 15281 views 114 likes

Cloud-free Europe

New observations for the new economy

08/03/2019 10953 views 90 likes

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