American-Japan new weather satellite

NASA's new weather satellite was launched into space with a mission to monitor rain and snow throughout the world as precisely as possible the unprecedented.

The Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory satellite was launched in February 28, 2014. (Picture from: http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/)

The satellite was named Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory, which is a joint effort between the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and carried to its orbit by a H-2A rocket from Tanegashima Space Center on 3:37 o'clock in the Friday morning Japan time, Februari 28, 2014.

GPM will provide the latest observation of rainfall every three hours from all over the world, so that it can supply information to scientists on climate change and the global water cycle, mission officials said, as quoted by LiveScience.

"It will provide data on the most accurate and sophisticated bulk of the most recent measurements from a NASA satellite," said Gail Skofronick-Jackson, the GPM project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, at a press conference last month.

Diagram of the GPM Core Observatory showing its main instruments and components.. (Picture from: http://pmm.nasa.gov/node/909)

Approximately GPM Core was 8,500 lbs or 3,850 kilograms satellite will orbit the Earth at an altitude of 407 kilometers, or as high as the distance the International Space Station. The object was to surround the planet once every 93 minutes, and completed about 16 orbits per day.
This satellite use two instruments namely GPM Microwave Imager (GMI) and two frequency rain radar (DPR) to study rainfall and snow from the Arctic circle to circle the Antarctic in the south, which will give a great overview of the clouds and storm systems.

"This instrument will allow scientists to look into the cloud," said Steve Neeck, Deputy Director of the flight program at NASA's Earth science division

"GMI will detect the total rainfall in all layers of the cloud, including, for the first time, to detect light rain and snow," he said.

"Parliament will create a detailed three-dimensional measurements of the structure and level of rainfall as well as particle size decrease," he added.

GPM core spacecraft will also serve as an anchor of global weather network and become climate satellites, some of which are already in orbit.

"The GPM, through centers and satellite constellation observatory will dramatically increase our knowledge of precipitation globally and increase our ability to predict, as well as the risks," said Neeck.

GPM Core satellite is the cost of NASA reach 933 million U.S. dollars designed to last at least three years, but officials in the mission it believes there will be a new data collection efforts so that the satellite can be much longer than that.

"As you know, TRMM is designed for three years, and now it is already 16 years of operations," said project manager GPM, Art Azarbarzin, of NASA Goddard, referring to the NASA-JAXA Satellite Measuring tropical rainfall, which was launched in 1997.

"We have designed the same way," he said. *** [EKA | FROM VARIOUS SOURCES | LIVESCIENCE]

Note: This blog can be accessed via your smart phone.