Since 6 September, Salzburg in Austria has been hosting over 800 scientists from 53 different countries for the Envisat Symposium to present, discuss and exchange results collected since the launch of the largest Earth Observation spacecraft ever built. After two and a half years in orbit, all instruments are in perfect working condition and results from many areas of Earth sciences and environmental monitoring were presented.
Today's transmission provides an overview of the most important results, including soundbites by leading scientists Duncan Wingham (GB) and Hennie Kelder (NL), of EC representative Marco Malacarne and ESA Director Jose Achache. Images and animations presented to the audience were transferred onto video, and some deonstrations of real-time delivery of Envisat data on, for example, Hurricane Frances, filmed at the symposium exhibition.
The future looks promising as Envisat still has 75% of its fuel left, opening up the prospect of ten-year mission instead of five originally envisaged.