Kourou – Finmeccanica welcomes the launch of Sentinel-1B of the European Space Agency, the second radar satellite of the European program Copernicus. The launch took place yesterday, at 11.02pm, from Kourou, in the French Guiana. “Manufactured by our subsidiary Thales Alenia Space, onboard of the Sentinel-1B there are important equipment from the laboratories of Finmeccanica, from the units for the regulation and distribution of power, to the stellar sensors for balance control – Luigi Pasquali, director of the Space Sector of Finmeccanica, commented -. Finmeccanica also contributes through Telespazio to the ground segment and operations management. It now begins the delicate phases of the checks of onboard systems. We will receive the data by the Matera Space Centre, managed through e-GEOS by Telespazio and by the Italian Space Agency. Those data will confirm whether Sentinel-1B is in good health. At that point we will be ready to obtain the information that the satellite will provide about our planet” , “These are basic data for monitoring the environment and climate change. ” (9Colonne)
