DLR - Earth Observation Center

Home|Sitemap|Contact|Accessibility Imprint and terms of use Privacy Cookies & Tracking |Deutsch

You are here: Home:News / Archive:Archive 2007

Successful Launch of Calibration Laboratory

04 December 2007
IMF has set-up a new laboratory for calibration of imaging spectrometers. This Europe-wide unique facility was co-funded by ESA to establish a ‚Calibration Homebase’ (CHB) for the airborne hyperspectral sensor APEX, which is currently under development. In November 2007 APEX was for the first time in the CHB to characterise the instrument and to test the computer controlled measurement procedures. CHB demonstrated that it is well-prepared for its upcoming tasks.

Full article

German-Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System (GITEWS) is on a good track

06 November 2007
Within the frame of today’s International Steering Committee Meeting of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Indonesian State Ministry of Research and Technology (RISTEK) the newly developed Decision Support System (DSS) was presented. The DSS is designed and implemented under the management of the German Remote Sensing Data Center (DFD) of DLR. The meeting of this committee took place on November 6 and 7, 2007 at DFD in Oberpfaffenhofen.

Full article

GMES Atmosphere

10 October 2007
DLR-DFD provides an ensemble forecast of air pollutant concentrations for all of Europe up to 72 hours. This service is part of the GMES Service Element PROMOTE funded by the European Space Agency. The service is realised in collaboration with L'Institut National de l'Environnement Industriel et des Risques (F), Meteo-France (F) and the Rhenish Institute for Environmental Research (D).

Full article

	Einweihung der Empfangsstation in Chetumal 03. Oktober 2007 Am 2. Oktober 2007 wurde eine neue Satellitendatenempfangsstation des Deutschen Fernerkundungsdatenzentrums des DLR in Chetumal/Yucatan, Mexiko, durch den Staatspräsidenten von Mexiko, Herrn Präsidenten Felipe Calderon sowie den mexikanischen Umweltminister und den Gouverneur von Quintana Roo feierlich eingeweiht.
Full article

Virtual Institute "Environmental Research Station Schneefernerhaus"

17 July 2007
DLR contribution to temperature measurements in the upper mesosphere 17 July 2007 On 17 July 2007 principal representatives of the research institutions associated in the Schneefernerhaus Environmental Research Station (UFS) met on the Zugspitze mountain. With the participation of Sigmar Gabriel, Germany’s Minister of the Environment, and state secretary Dr. Otmar Bernhard of Bavaria’s State Ministry of Environment, Health and Consumer Protection, future cooperation in atmospheric and climate research was initiated by the institutions involved. In this consortium, DFD contributes the ground-based infrared spectrometer GRIPS 3, which delivers precise measurement of temperatures in the upper mesosphere at some 80-90 km altitude.

Full article

"The Eye of the Sky" Exhibition

29. März 2007
From March 29 to December 2, 2007, the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and Gasometer Oberhausen GmbH are presenting "The Eye of the Sky" ("Das Auge des Himmels"). This exhibition of 58 large-format images of Earth as well as other remote sensing displays can be seen at the Gasometer in Oberhausen, one of Europe's most unusual and lofty exhibition facilities. All the images on display were especially prepared by DLR's German Remote Sensing Data Center (DFD) and Remote Sensing Technology Institute (IMF) and are being shown for the first time in this constellation.

Full article

Successful conclusion to evaluation of Applied Remote Sensing Cluster

29 January 2007
Between January 23 and 25, 2007, the scientific competence and strategic positioning of the institutes composing DLR’s Applied Remote Sensing Cluster were analyzed by an international group of evaluators seven years after its founding. Over three days, the 13 experts in the group, representing the scientific, public and private sectors, had an opportunity to inform themselves in some detail about the work of the cluster.

Full article

ZKI produces maps of affected regions after tropical cyclone 'Sidr' in Bangladesh

21 November 2007
During the night from November 15 and 16, 2007, tropical cyclone 'Sidr' swept over the the southwestern part of Bangladesh, leaving behind a trail of destruction. With wind speeds of up to 240 km/h at the coast and up to 160 km/h at the capital Dhaka, Sidr forced three million people to flee from their homes in 15 coastal districts of Bangladesh.

ZKI maps flooding in Mexico with high-resolution radar satellite TerraSAR-X

07 November 2007
In early November 2007, heavy rainfalls lasting for a whole week led to devastating floods in the Mexican states of Tabasco and Chiapas, displacing about one million people, which is approximately half of Tabasco's overall population. About 80% of the state of Tabasco's surface (overall area: 25,000 km²) has been temporarily flooded. The region around the city of Villahermosa with its population of approximately 600.000 was hit most by the floods.

UN-Büro für schnelle Hilfe bei Katastrophen mit starker DLR-Unterstützung eröffnet

29. Oktober 2007
Wenn es bei Katastrophen wie Erdbeben, Überschwemmungen oder Vulkanausbrüchen um schnelle Hilfe geht, sind satellitengestützte Informationen über das Krisengebiet von unschätzbarem Wert. Um diese noch schneller als bisher zur Verfügung zu stellen, haben heute die Vereinten Nationen (UN) in Bonn ein spezielles Büro mit starker Unterstützung des Deutschen Zentrums für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) eröffnet.

DFD co-coordinates the 2nd European Emergency Exercise GNEX’07

15. Oktober 2007
The German Remote Sensing Data Center (DFD) of DLR is managing the second European wide exercise of the Network of Excellence GMOSS on the use of satellite imagery for supporting civil security crisis response capacities. The exercise involves more than 15 GMOSS contractors, associated partners and end-users and will last from October 15th to 18th. First results will be presented to the European Commission on October 19th.

PV 2007 International Conference

08 October 2007
After three very successful events, PV 2002 at CNES in Toulouse, France, PV 2004 at ESA/ESRIN in Frascati, Italy and PV 2005 at DCC in Edinburgh, UK, the conference series continues with PV 2007 addressing prospects in the domain of scientific and technical data preservation and value adding. The Conference will be held in October 9 – 11 at the German Remote Sensing Data Center (DFD).

Initial measurements from GOME-2: No substantial recovery in the ozone hole

05 October 2007
Every year in the southern hemisphere spring, a considerable chemical reduction in ozone is observed in the lower and middle stratosphere, which extends from 10 to 15 kilometres high. The term "ozone hole" was coined to describe this phenomenon. Its expansion shows strong annual progression. Its size has varied considerably over the years, but the ozone layer shows no signs of overall recovery. This was the discovery of scientists from the German Aerospace Center (DLR) when they analysed data from the EUMETSAT MetOp Earth monitoring satellite.

Forest fires in southern Europe, August 2007

27 August 2007
In 2007, southeastern Europe was affected by the worst wildfires for decades. Conditioned by extrem heat since middle of August 2007, large natural or man-made fires started. After the end of August, Greece was the most affected country. The fires killed at least 60 people. It was expected that the death toll rises, since many villages were still trapped by the fires. The Peleponnes peninsula was affected most. Following the devastating situation, the Greek government had declared the nation-wide state of emergency. In the meantime, the Greek emergency services were supported by international forces. 13 fire-fighting airplanes and helicopters were deployed - including three German helicopters.

Fires on the Canary Islands, August 2007

09 August 2007
The islands of Tenerife and Gran Canaria of the Canary Islands (Spain) were affected by some of the worst forest fires in the history of Spain. The fires forced more than 10.000 people to temporarily leave their homes, some of which were destroyed by the fires. The Spanish Government and the Monitoring and Information Centre (MIC) of the European Commission triggered the International Charter Space and Major Disasters to estimate the damaged area based on satellite data.

TerraSAR-X - Germany's radar eye in space

09 August 2007
TerraSAR-X is a German Earth-observation satellite. Its primary payload is an X-band radar sensor with a range of different modes of operation, allowing it to record images with different swath widths, resolutions and polarisations. TerraSAR-X thus offers space-based observation capabilities that were previously unavailable. The objective of the mission is to provide value-added SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) data in the X-band, for research and development purposes as well as scientific and commercial applications.

Flood in the United Kingdom, July 2007

26 Juli 2007
Following the severe flooding that had affected the central and northern parts of England in the end of June and the beginning of July 2007, the south-west of England and Wales had been hit by severe weather again, with flooding affecting thousands of homes and leaving many without water and electricity. The areas worst affected included the counties of Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire, Hereford and Worcestershire.

Flood in England and Wales, England July 2007

06 July 2007
Heavy rainstorms caused by an extraordinary weather situation led to major floodings in parts of the UK. During June 2007, a large low-pressure area coming from the Atlantic Ocean was trapped over Wales and England. The highest precipitation rates measured over the last decade were recorded at a number of meteorological stations in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and the Midlands

TerraSAR-X exceeds all expectations: German radar satellite sends first data in record time

21 June 2007
Scientists and commercial users are flabbergasted and only the most optimistic of engineers could have expected it, but just four days after the launch of the German radar satellite TerraSAR-X from Baikonur, brilliant first satellite images have been received.

TerraSAR-X - German radar satellite launch successful

15 June 2007
The successful launch of the German radar satellite TerraSAR-X on Friday 15 June 2007 at 08:14 local time (04:14 CEST) from the Russian Cosmodrome in Baikonur (Kazakhstan) represents the start of a new level of quality in the mapping of Earth. Over the next five years, new and high-quality radar images of our planet's surface will be collected.

NDMC Kick-off

28. Mai 2007
Unter der Schirmherrschaft des Bayerischen Staatsministeriums für Umwelt, Gesundheit und Verbraucherschutz fand vom 14.-18. Mai 2007 in Garmisch-Partenkirchen das Kick-off-Treffen zu dem neuen internationalen Network for the Detection of Mesopause Change, NDMC, statt. 46 Wissenschaftlergruppen aus gegenwärtig 12 Nationen tragen mit bodengebundenen Messungen an mehr als 50 Orten der Welt mit ihren Messungen zur Beobachtung der Klimaentwicklung bei. Weitere Ziele sind Satellitenvalidierung, Technologieentwicklung sowie die Untersuchung einer Vielzahl grundlagenwissenschaftlicher Fragestellungen.
Die Initiative zum NDMC wurde vom DLR-DFD begründet; NDMC wird gemeinsam vom DFD mit der argentinischen CONICET koordiniert. Mit Messungen des GRIPS 3 - Infrarot-Spektrometers vom Schneefernerhaus auf der Zugspitze aus beteiligt sich das DFD aktiv auch mit eigenen Messungen an NDMC. Darüber hinaus bildet das im DFD angesiedelte WDC-RSAT die Kommunikations- und Informationsplattform für das NDMC.

Switch to NOAA-18 for AVHRR data products

02 May 2007
Since 1 April 2007, AVHRR data from NOAA-18 have been used by DFD to generate such products as vegetation indices (NDVI), land surface temperatures (LST) and sea surface temperatures (SST) for Europe. This switchover from NOAA-17 data assures the continuation of a product time series now extending over ten years. As an example, the image at the link below show a synthesis of European vegetation indices for the week of 8-15 April 2007.

New European weather satellite MetOp measures ozone and nitrogen dioxide concentrations with high precision— a meteorological first

06 March 2007
MetOp-A (Meteorological Operational Satellite), launched in October 2006, is improving weather forecasting in the three-day period. The satellite has an instrument than can measure ozone content as well as the concentration of trace chemicals, thereby determining air quality. This instrument, a spectrometer called GOME-2 (Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment), is being currently tested for full functionality during its first operational phase; it has already transmitted its first dataset, which is presently being evaluated.

"Kunstwerk Erde", An exhibition at Place Schumann in Brussels 7 March – 6 April

28 February 2007
Between March 7 and April 6 in Brussels, the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres and DLR will be displaying satellite images from the German Remote Sensing Data Center, the Remote Sensing Technology Institute and other partners on screens up to 12 square meters in size. At this large exhibit, both the general public and members of parliament will have an opportunity to inform themselves about the potential and use of satellite data for earth observation. These large format images in glowing colors convey an out of the ordinary impression of deserts, glaciers, volcanos and cities. They suggest the kinds of information satellite data is able to provide to a variety a of scientific disciplines and what contribution they can accordingly make to investigations of the earth and the environment. After being shown in Germany, in locations such as Bremen, Munich, Karlsruhe and Berlin, this newly revised and enlarged exhibit will now be presented to an international public.

TerraSAR-X is ready for transportation to Baikonur

16 February 2007
End of January an international review board declared the ground segment and the satellite TerraSAR-X as ready for mission. The transportation to the launch site onboard of a Antonov 124- the world biggest transportation aircraft - will be carried out later this month. After arrival the launch preparation phase will be started, conducted by teams of EADS Astrium and DLR. The launch is expected for end of March or begin of April this year.

Successful Launch of Calibration Laboratory

German-Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System (GITEWS) is on a good track

GMES Atmosphere

Einweihung der Empfangsstation in Chetumal

Virtual Institute "Environmental Research Station Schneefernerhaus"

"The Eye of the Sky" Exhibition

Successful conclusion to evaluation of Applied Remote Sensing Cluster

"Kunstwerk Erde", An exhibition at Place Schumann in Brussels 7 March – 6 April