The Soyuz rocket that will take Sentinel-1B, three CubeSats and Microscope into orbit is rolled out to the launch pad in preparation for liftoff on 22 April 2016. Once in orbit, Sentinel-1B will provide radar images of Earth for Europe’s Copernicus environmental monitoring programme.

With the Sentinel-1 mission designed as a two-satellite constellation, Sentinel-1B will join its identical twin, Sentinel-1A, which was launched two years ago.