Earth Observing Fleet (December 2021)

This animation shows the orbits of NASA's fleet of Earth observing spacecraft that are considered operational as of December 2021. Note that Landsat 9 is still completing the commissioning period and is expected to be declared operational in mid-January 2022. The clouds used in this version are from a high resolution GEOS model run at 10 minute time steps interpolated down to the per-frame level.

Changes to this version include: removal of Landsat-7 and addition of Landsat-9.

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Spacecraft included:
• Aqua
• Aura
• CALIPSO: Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation
• CYGNSS-1: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 1
• CYGNSS-2: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 2
• CYGNSS-3: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 3
• CYGNSS-4: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 4
• CYNGSS-5: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 5
• CYGNSS-6: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 6
• CYGNSS-7: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 7
• CYGNSS-8: Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System 8
• Cloudsat
• GPM: Global Precipitation Measurement
• GRACE-FO-1: Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow On-1
• GRACE-FO-2: Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow On-2
• ICESat-2
• ISS: International Space Station
• Landsat 8
• Landsat 9
• OCO-2: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2
• SMAP: Soil Moisture Passive Active
• Suomi NPP: Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership
• Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich
• Terra