Mtg-I, the satellite is ready for launch: it will improve the prediction of violent weather phenomena

“With this new constellation could have been predicted the flood in the Marches? It would not be serious to say yes; forecasting and monitoring are separate aspects, which use different models. It should also be emphasized that a forecast is not the responsibility of a single person: it involves numerous researchers, many meteorologists who have been employed in the sector for years, who work for national or local bodies, and who exploit European models. Today the goal is that the new system increase short-term forecasting ability. Because it’s one thing to anticipate a phenomenon by half an hour, quite another to do it hours before. There are all the technological conditions for this to happen”.

Silvia Puca it is peremptory. Pragmatic as befits those who, like her, work for the Civil Protection in the Office for the prevention of natural risks. And when he talks about new technological conditions he refers to Meteosat Third Generation Imageror Mtg-Ithe first European satellite of a mini-constellation of six which on Tuesday 13 December, when in Italy it will be 21:30on board an Ariane 5 will be launched towards its geostationary orbit, 36 thousand kilometers from the Earth (it will be possible to follow the lift-off on Esa Web TV). A satellite – and a constellation, the third generation of Meteosats – which once operational will provide fundamental information for the early detection and forecasting of violent stormsfor the forecast and climate monitoring.

Puca speaks from Fucino Space Center, from where Telespazio, a leading company in telecommunications and satellite services, will manage the launch phase and first putting into orbit, in “Leop” jargon, of Mtg-I. “The new generation of Meteosat, consisting of four satellites imagers and by two sounders, aims for a decisive improvement of the so-called nowcastingi.e. the forecasting capacity in the very short period of the rapidly changing weather phenomena”explains Luigi Pasquali, CEO of Telespazio and head of Leonardo’s extra-atmospheric programs, a group to whose laboratories in Campi Bisenzio we owe one of the two most important instruments of the first Mtg satellite.

They are two new and innovative devices: a Flexible Combined Imagerwhich with its 16 spectral channels will cover the visible, near infrared and infrared, and the first Lightning Imager European, a “lightning meter” unique of its kind, capable of detect even a single flash in the skyboth day and night.