CEOS EO HANDBOOK – MISSION SUMMARY - Metop-B -
Full Name Meteorological Operational Polar Satellite - B
aka Metop-1
Status Operational (nominal)
Mission Agencies EUMETSAT, CNES, ESA, NOAA Launch Date 17 Sep 2012
Mission Links mission site | data access portal EOL Date Aug 2024
EO Portal Info NORAD Catalog # 38771 (TLE)
International Designator 2012-049A
Orbit Type Sun-synchronous Orbit Period 101.4 minutes
Orbit Sense Descending Orbit Inclination 98.7 deg
Orbit Altitude 824 km Orbit Longitude
Orbit LST 9:30 Repeat Cycle 29 days
Objectives and Applications Meteorology, climatology. Due to a hardware problem on the Metop-B satellite, the A-DCS3 instrument is only supporting an ARGOS-2 service.
Mission Measurements
CategoryParameterInstrument(s)
AtmosphereAerosols AVHRR/3, GOME-2, IASI
Atmospheric Humidity Fields AMSU-A, GOME-2, GRAS, HIRS/4, IASI, MHS
Atmospheric Winds IASI
Cloud type, amount and cloud top temperature AMSU-A, AVHRR/3, GOME-2, HIRS/4, IASI, MHS
Cloud particle properties and profile AMSU-A, MHS
Liquid water and precipitation rate AMSU-A, AVHRR/3, MHS
Ozone GOME-2, HIRS/4, IASI
Radiation budget AMSU-A, AVHRR/3, GOME-2, HIRS/4, IASI
Trace gases (excluding ozone) HIRS/4, IASI
Atmospheric Temperature Fields AMSU-A, GRAS, HIRS/4, IASI
LandAlbedo and reflectance AVHRR/3
Soil moisture AMSU-A, ASCAT
Vegetation AVHRR/3
Surface temperature (land) AMSU-A, AVHRR/3, HIRS/4, IASI
Multi-purpose imagery (land) AVHRR/3
OceanOcean surface winds AMSU-A, ASCAT
Surface temperature (ocean) AVHRR/3, HIRS/4, IASI
Multi-purpose imagery (ocean) AVHRR/3
Snow & IceSnow cover, edge and depth AMSU-A, AVHRR/3
Sea ice cover, edge and thickness AMSU-A, ASCAT, AVHRR/3
Mission Instruments
A-DCS3 - Argos Advanced Data Collection System3
AMSU-A - Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A
ASCAT - Advanced Scatterometer
AVHRR/3 - Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer/3
GOME-2 - Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment - 2
GRAS - Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) Receiver for Atmospheric Sounding
HIRS/4 - High Resolution Infra-red Sounder/4
IASI - Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer
MHS - Microwave Humidity Sounder
S&R (NOAA) - Search and Rescue Satellite Aided Tracking
SEM (POES) - Space Environment Monitor
Featured Datasets
More Datasets
NOAA POES and METOP Local Area Coverage Imagery
Jan-2019



This collection is composed of AVHRR Level 1B products (1.1 km) reprocessed from the NOAA POES and Metop AVHRR sensors data acquired at the University of Dundee and University of Bern ground stations and from the ESA and University of Bern data historical archive. The data collection covers Europe and the neighbouring regions in the period of 1 January 1981 to 31 December 2019. Access is provided through the ESA TPM scheme. Read more

OpenSearch Datasets Selected IDN OpenSearch Results (search all 82 )
AAMH CPEX
Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT) CPEX V1
AVHRR Level-1B Local Area Coverage Imagery
CARVE Modeled Gross Ecosystem CO2 Exchange and Respiration, Alaska, 2012-2014
ESA Aerosol Climate Change Initiative (Aerosol_cci): Level 3 aerosol products from the Multi-Sensor ...
ESA Lakes Climate Change Initiative (Lakes_cci): Lake products, Version 1.1
ESA Ozone Climate Change Initiative (Ozone CCI): Level 3 Nadir Ozone Profile Merged Data Product, ve ...
ESA Ozone Climate Change Initiative (Ozone CCI): Level 3 Total Ozone Merged Data Product, version 01
ESA Sea Surface Temperature Climate Change Initiative (ESA SST CCI): Analysis long term product vers ...
ESA Soil Moisture Climate Change Initiative (Soil_Moisture_cci): ACTIVE Product, Version 05.2

Selected FedEO OpenSearch Results (view all 131 results: browser , table )
METOP GOME-2 - Water Vapour (H2O) - Global
METOP GOME-2 - Cloud Top Pressure (CTP) - Global
METOP GOME-2 - Sulfur Dioxide (SO2) - Global
METOP GOME-2 - Ozone (O3) - Global
METOP GOME-2 - Tropospheric Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2) - Global
METOP GOME-2 - Cloud Fraction (CF) - Global
ASCAT Winds and Soil Moisture at 12.5 km Swath Grid - Metop
ASCAT Winds and Soil Moisture at 25 km Swath Grid - Metop-C
AVHRR Atmospheric Motion Vectors - Metop - Polar
ASCAT Winds and Soil Moisture at 25 km Swath Grid - Metop

Want to explore more? Read about FedEO by ESA or click here to search FedEO or CMR OpenSearch by NASA