Hellenic Fire System moves a step closer to launch
Following the launch of two radar satellites for Greece at the end of last year, four infrared imaging satellites dedicated to detecting and monitoring wildfires across the country are now being prepared for launch this spring. As part of the final preparations, these four CubeSats have recently undergone magnetic cleaning at the European Space Agency’s facilities in the Netherlands.
The new Hellenic Fire System is the second set of operational Earth observation satellites developed under the Greek National Small Satellite Programme, which will ultimately comprise 13 operational satellites grouped into four categories according to their instruments.
Financed by Greece through the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility, the programme aims to advance national satellite technology and applications, promote job creation and economic growth, and strengthen Greece’s capabilities in disaster management, continuous environmental monitoring, and national security.
While the Hellenic Space Center and the Greek Ministry of Digital Governance lead the programme, ESA provides the overarching framework and supports the development of the different satellite systems.
The upcoming constellation of four CubeSats has been developed by OroraTech to provide Greece with sovereign, space-based thermal monitoring capabilities. Given the country’s vulnerability to wildfires, the system is designed to detect, monitor and characterise fires with high reliability, delivering systematic coverage of the Greek territory.
Each satellite, based on an 8U CubeSat platform equipped with one deployable solar panel measuring 42 × 22 cm, carries two infrared imagers operating in the midwave infrared and longwave infrared spectral bands. These instruments will capture infrared imagery over Greece and other areas of interest to detect active fires, measure thermal anomalies and assess fire radiative intensity.
The system will enable the early identification of emerging hotspots and continuous monitoring of fire dynamics through precise measurement of thermal emissions.
Before these four Hellenic Fire System CubeSats are shipped to the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California launch expected later this spring, they have spent a few days at ESA’s establishment in Noordwijk in the Netherlands being magnetically cleaned.
This ensures that any residual magnetic fields are removed, primarily to ensure that the satellites’ sensitive on-board attitude control systems operate correctly. If not demagnetised, a satellite’s own magnetism can interfere with its instruments, cause unwanted rotation, or interact with Earth's magnetic field in ways that could be detrimental to the mission.
Svein-Jarle Lokas, ESA’s Project Manager for the Greek national missions, said, “The process of demagnetising the satellites went very well, meaning that we are one step closer to launch. We are now preparing them for shipment to Exolaunch in Germany, who will oversee final preparations for launch and integration onto the Falcon 9 rocket.”
