The SMOS mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) has been dubbed the “water mission” and has already achieved its two main objectives: to make global measurements of ocean salinity and soil moisture every three days, though not exclusively.
This is one of the main conclusions of the second conference of science SMOS, a satellite of three branches and 72 antennas.
SMOS was launched in November 2009 and has since sent to the antennas of the ESA in Villanueva de la Cañada and Kiruna (Sweden) data to calculate ocean salinity and ground moisture, leading to better understand the ocean circulation and the water cycle or deepen in preventing hurricanes and fires.
The salinity, which has the peculiarity that only modified by exchange with the atmosphere, is one of the two variables that define the density of sea water, the other is the temperature.
The satellites measure the latter for decades, but until now had not managed to salinity, told Efe Jordi Font, co-lead investigator of SMOS, the Institute of Marine Sciences (Superior Council Research).
The density differences are what keep the great ocean currents, according Font, for those who know the ocean circulation and the water cycle -evaporación, clouds, rainfall, moisture-allows scientists to understand better how it is affecting and affected by climate change, and serves to improve weather and climate models.
For example, SMOS has shed light on the evolution of meandering Gulf Stream, one of the most studied systems currents, which originates in the Caribbean and flows into the North Atlantic.
SMOS has also found that the salinity of the ocean surface is affected by the passage of a hurricane: Igor 2010 caused the water in the mouth of the Amazon to increase its salinity when mixed with water deeper and savory.
Data from this satellite, according Font, they complement those offered by 3,000 buoys with sensors thrown into the sea within the Argo project (more precise in measuring the salinity of the satellite but with less capacity for global data).
As for salinity data “I do not think we’ll find surprises,” but the important thing was to demonstrate that this component can be measured from space continuously and with a higher resolution than any of the buoys He confirmed Font.
Another thing SMOS is measuring the amount of water stored in the vegetation, which is used for example to evaluate agricultural production or assess the risk of fire.
The goal in the future, predicting fires in forest areas and their size.
Martin Manuel Neira, ESA (was chief engineer of instrument SMOS) satellite has met the two main objectives for which it was designed: to measure salinity and humidity.
However, it has also proven useful for measuring arctic ice up to a half meter-thick or speed or typhoon winds (300 kph).
SMOS was initially scheduled for three years, but his “good health” allowed to be active at least until 2017.
The scientific community, according to various sources, is very interested in pursuing further, as for example from the point of view of climate data they are more useful in the long term.
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