CALIPSO

Updated on Sep 23, 2024

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Mission type Earth observation COSPAR ID 2006-016A Mission duration ongoing Speed on orbit 7.51 km/s Inclination 98.2176°		Operator NASA / CNES SATCAT no. 29108 Launch date 28 April 2006 Period 1.6 hours Cost 223 million USD

Website www-calipso.larc.nasa.gov Manufacturer Cannes Mandelieu Space Center Similar CloudSat, Aqua, Aura, Parasol, Terra

CALIPSO is a joint NASA (USA) and CNES (France) environmental satellite, built in the Cannes Mandelieu Space Center, which was launched atop a Delta II rocket on April 28, 2006. Its name stands for Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations.

Passive and active remote sensing Instruments on board the CALIPSO satellite monitor aerosols and clouds 24 hours a day. CALIPSO is part of the "A Train", flying in formation with several other satellites (Aqua, Aura and CloudSat).

Calipso

Mission

Three instruments:

Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) - a lidar that provides high-resolution vertical profiles of aerosols and clouds.

Wide Field Camera (WFC) - a modified version of the commercial off-the-shelf Ball Aerospace CT-633 star tracker camera. It was selected to match band 1 of the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite.

Imaging Infrared Radiometer (IIR) - used to detect cirrus cloud emissivity and particle size. The CALIOP laser beam is aligned with the center of the IIR image to optimize joint CALIOP/IIR observations.

CALIPSO CALIPSO A Global Perspective of Clouds and Aerosols from Space

In February 2009, CALIPSO switched over to the redundant laser as scheduled. The primary laser achieved its mission goal of three years of successful operation, and the redundant laser has been performing beyond expectations.

The CALIPSO mission was granted extended mission status in June 2009.

References

CALIPSO Wikipedia

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Calipso

Mission

References