First light from the Hellenic Fire System

The Hellenic Fire System has returned its first image, marking an important milestone in Greece's future national space-based wildfire monitoring capability.

Launched at the beginning of May, the Hellenic Fire System comprises four CubeSats that each carry two infrared imagers operating in the midwave and longwave infrared spectral bands to detect active fires, identify thermal anomalies and assess fire radiative intensity over Greece and other areas of interest.

The Hellenic Fire System captured its first thermal image over Greece after just two weeks of instrument calibration. It reveals the thermal signature of the Athens metropolitan as well as the islands of Andros, Tinos, Skyros, Chios, Kea and Kythnos. The image also captures thermal patterns across the Aegean Sea, highlighting the instrument's ability to observe both land and maritime thermal phenomena.

The image demonstrates the successful performance of the satellite and its thermal infrared instrument, paving the way for the system's future operational services.

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