NASA’s New Winds Mission Gathers 1st Data

After being attached outside the International Space Station, NASA’s newest Earth-observing mission is collecting its first science data on ocean wind speeds and direction.

NASA’s newest Earth-observing mission, the International Space Station–Rapid Scatterometer, or ISS-RapidScat, is collecting its first science data on ocean wind speeds and direction following its installation and activation on the exterior of the space station’s Columbus module.

Ground controllers at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston robotically assembled the RapidScat instrument September 29 to 30. On October 1, the instrument was powered on, its antenna began spinning and it started transmitting and receiving its first winds data.

On October 3, mission scientists processed their first winds data and produced their first uncalibrated images: a partial global map of wind speeds (above) and a close-up image of what was then Tropical Storm Simon, brewing off the west coast of Mexico.

“Most satellite missions require weeks or even months to produce data of the quality that we seem to be getting from the first few days of RapidScat,” said RapidScat project scientist Ernesto Rodriguez of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. “We have been very lucky that within the first days of operations we have already been able to observe a developing tropical cyclone.”

For more on ISS-RapidScat, see this NASA press release.