ESA - meteosat third generation

ESA title

The mission

Building on the long-standing partnership between ESA and Eumetsat, Meteosat Third Generation will guarantee the continuity of data for weather forecasting from geostationary orbit for the next two decades. The full MTG system is based on a series of two types of satellite: four MTG-Imagers and two MTG-Sounders.

Launches

MTG-I1: 13 December 2022 from Kourou, French Guiana on Ariane 5
MTG-I2: from Kourou, French Guiana on Ariane 6

MTG-S1: 1 July 2025 from Cape Canaveral, Florida on SpaceX Falcon 9

6 satellite system
4 Imager satellites
2 Sounder satellites
20-year operational life

meteosat third generation

Medicane Jolina from MSG

Getting to the core of a medicane

27/03/2026 3379 views 36 likes

MTG-I2 pushed into place for final environmental tests

Next MTG satellite passes final environmental tests

27/03/2026 437 views 18 likes

Press Release N° 13–2026

Media invitation: three innovative European weather and climate satellites in the cleanroom

Journalists are invited to a one-off opportunity to see three ESA-built satellites in their final preparations before liftoff.

11/03/2026 1014 views

Global air humidity by MTG-Sounder

Europe’s next-generation weather satellite sends back first…

27/01/2026 87778 views 87 likes

Second MTG-Imager in the thermal vacuum chamber

Second MTG-Imager satellite passes thermal vacuum test

04/09/2025 2625 views 38 likes

Teamwork for LEOP at Fucino for Meteosat Third Generation sounder satellite

Another milestone for the future of European weather observ…

21/07/2025 2632 views 27 likes

MTG-S1 and Sentinel-4 inside Falcon 9

Media invitation: MTG-S1 and Sentinel-4 pre-launch briefings

Sentinel-4 on MTG-S

Media invitation: cleanroom visit to MTG-S and Sentinel-4

More items

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02/12/2022 737 views 7 likes
Read

Discover Meteosat Third Generation

Meteosat Third Generation weather satellites

Introducing MTG

20029 views 34 likes

MSG-4 in orbit

Solid heritage

1163 views 2 likes

Rainy weather

Forecasting the weather

4298 views 3 likes

Cyclone Amphan making landfall over Bangladesh

Weathering the storm

1565 views 3 likes

Observing fast-evolving weather with MTG

Satellite constellation

3627 views 17 likes

FCI at Test Centre

Flexible Combined Imager

7399 views 26 likes

MTG to monitor lightning

Lightning Imager

12222 views 17 likes

Meteosat Third Generation Sounder up close

Infrared Sounder

3731 views 8 likes

Testing MTG imager

Facts and figures

3334 views 12 likes

MTG-I and MTG-S

Team talk: 10 things about Meteosat Third Generation

841 views 1 likes

MTG-Sounder satellite over the equator

Team talk: Soundbites from the cleanroom with MTG-S1

250 views 0 likes

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