CryoSat to observe Earth’s ice cover

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM3WUMEG5G_index_0.html
ESA PR 03-2010. The European Space Agency is about to launch the most
sophisticated satellite ever to investigate the Earth's ice fields and
map ice thickness over water and land: lift-off scheduled for 25
February.
ESA's ice mission satellite CryoSat will be placed into orbit 700 km
above Earth by a Russian Dnepr rocket to be launched from the Baikonur
Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Lift-off is scheduled to take place at 14:57 CET (13:57 UTC) on
Thursday 25 February 2010. The launcher is operated by the
international space company Kosmotras.
CryoSat will be the third of ESA's Earth Explorer satellites in orbit,
following on from GOCE (launched in March 2009) and SMOS (launched in
November 2009). It was originally due to be the first in the Earth
Explorer series, but the first satellite was lost as a result of a
launcher failure in October 2005.
The 700 kg CryoSat spacecraft – whose name comes from the Greek kruos
meaning icy cold – carries the first all-weather microwave radar
altimeter. The instrument has been optimised for determining changes
in the thickness of both floating sea ice, which can be up to several
metres, and polar land ice sheets, which in Antarctica can be up to
five kilometres. The mission will deliver data on the rate of change
of the ice thickness accurate to within one centimetre.

CryoSat-2 measuring sea-ice thickness

CryoSat-2 measuring sea-ice thickness
Recent record-lows in the extent of summer Arctic sea-ice cover
demonstrate that significant changes are occurring in the polar
regions. Ice cover has been mapped from space for many years by
satellites such as Envisat. But to understand more about how climate
change is affecting these sensitive regions, there is also an urgent
need to determine how ice thickness is changing. Data from CryoSat
will lead to a better understanding of the dynamics of ice mass,
provide the scientific community with valuable information on this
variable and contribute to climate change studies.

On the launch day, ESA will be opening a European Press Centre at its
European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany, from
10:00 to 16:30, hosting a launch event from 11:30 to 16:00.
A live televised transmission of the launch will provide pictures from
the Baikonur Cosmodrome and from Mission Control at ESA/ESOC in
Darmstadt for broadcasters (further details of TV transmission at
http://television.esa.int).
ESA senior management and programme specialists will be on hand to
explain the mission and give interviews.