BackForwardInstrument:  ASCAT 

Instrument details
Acronym ASCAT
Full name Advanced Scatterometer
Purpose Sea surface wind vector. Also large-scale soil moisture
Short description
  • C-band (5.255 GHz), 1 MHz bandwidth, side looking both left and right.  3 antennas on each side
  • Monitoring and calibration information here
Background

Evolution of the AMI-SCAT flown on ERS-1 and ERS-2
Scanning Technique

Two 550-km swaths separated by a 700-km gap along-track.  3 looks each pixel (45, 90 and 135° azimuth)
Resolution Best quality: 50 km – standard quality: 25 km – basic sampling: 12.5 km
Coverage / Cycle Global coverage in 1.5 days
Mass 260 kg Power 215 W Data Rate 42 kbps

 

Providing Agency ESA
Instrument Maturity Flown on operational programme
Utilization Period: 2007 to 2027
Last update: 2024-09-23
Detailed characteristics
Satellites this instrument is flying on

Note: a red tag indicates satellites no longer operational, a green tag indicates operational satellites, a blue tag indicates future satellites

Instrument classification
  • Earth observation instrument
  • Active and radio-occultation sensor
  • Scatterometer
WIGOS Subcomponents
  • Subcomponent 1
  • Scatterometers [in SSO]
  • Scatterometer [in SSO]
Mission objectives
Primary mission objectives
  • Wind speed (near surface)
  • Wind vector (near surface)
Evaluation of Measurements