Sentinel-2C mission control team photo

At ESA’s ESOC mission control centre, in Darmstadt, Germany, every launch is preceded by the pre-launch briefing – and the all-important team photos.

The next satellite to be flown from ESOC, Sentinel-2C, is scheduled for launch on the final Vega rocket from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana, at 03:50 CEST on 4 September.

Sentinel-2C is the latest satellite in Europe's Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission. Sentinel-2 provides high-resolution optical imagery that covers all of Earth’s land and coastal waters every five days and which is used for a wide range of applications such as land, water and atmospheric monitoring.

Posing outside ESOC's Main Control Room, this is the team that will oversee Sentinel-2C’s crucial first hours in space and continue to fly the satellite for years to come as it gathers these valuable data.

Months of preparations and simulations at mission control culminated in last Thursday’s Sentinel-2C launch dress rehearsal. The dress rehearsal brought together the ESA teams with the mission’s institutional and industrial partners to complete a final, meticulous run through of the sequence of events that will take place on launch day.

Preparations, rehearsals, briefings and team photos complete, mission control is GO for launch.

Follow @esa, @esaoperations and @esa_eo on X and @europeanspaceagency @ESA_Earth on Instagram for live updates on the Sentinel-2C launch. Click here to find out how to watch the launch live.