NASA to Launch Ocean Wind Monitor to Space Station

Jan. 29, 2013

Trent J. Perrotto
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100
trent.j.perrotto@nasa.gov

Alan Buis
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-0474
alan.buis@jpl.nasa.gov

Josh Byerly
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
josh.byerly@nasa.gov

RELEASE: 13-032

NASA TO LAUNCH OCEAN WIND MONITOR TO SPACE STATION

WASHINGTON -- In a clever reuse of hardware originally built to test
parts of NASA's QuikScat satellite, the agency will launch the
ISS-RapidScat instrument to the International Space Station in 2014
to measure ocean-surface wind speed and direction.

The ISS-RapidScat instrument will help improve weather forecasts,
including hurricane monitoring, and understanding of how
ocean-atmosphere interactions influence Earth's climate.

"The ability for NASA to quickly reuse this hardware and launch it to
the space station is a great example of a low-cost approach that will
have high benefits to science and life here on Earth," said Mike
Suffredini, NASA's International Space Station program manager.

ISS-RapidScat will help fill the data gap created when QuikScat, which
was designed to last two years but operated for 10, stopped
collecting ocean wind data in late 2009. A scatterometer is a
microwave radar sensor used to measure the reflection or scattering
effect produced while scanning the surface of Earth from an aircraft
or a satellite.

NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have
studied next-generation replacements for QuikScat, but a successor
will not be available soon. To meet this challenge cost-effectively,
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., and the
agency's station program proposed adapting leftover QuikScat hardware
in combination with new hardware for use on the space station.

"ISS-RapidScat represents a low-cost approach to acquiring valuable
wind vector data for improving global monitoring of hurricanes and
other high-intensity storms," said Howard Eisen, ISS-RapidScat
project manager at JPL. "By leveraging the capabilities of the
International Space Station and recycling leftover hardware, we will
acquire good science data at a fraction of the investment needed to
launch a new satellite."

ISS-RapidScat will have measurement accuracy similar to QuikScat's and
will survey all regions of Earth accessible from the space station's
orbit. The instrument will be launched to the space station aboard a
SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft. It will be installed on the end of
the station's Columbus laboratory as an autonomous payload requiring
no interaction by station crew members. It is expected to operate
aboard the station for two years.

ISS-RapidScat will take advantage of the space station's unique
characteristics to advance understanding of Earth's winds. Current
scatterometer orbits pass the same point on Earth at approximately
the same time every day. Since the space station's orbit intersects
the orbits of each of these satellites about once every hour,
ISS-RapidScat can serve as a calibration standard and help scientists
stitch together the data from multiple sources into a long-term
record.

ISS-RapidScat also will collect measurements of Earth's global wind
field at all times of day for all locations. Variations in winds
caused by the sun can play a significant role in the formation of
tropical clouds and tropical systems that play a dominant role in
Earth's water and energy cycles. ISS-RapidScat observations will help
scientists understand these phenomena better and improve weather and
climate models.

The ISS-RapidScat project is a joint partnership of JPL and NASA's
International Space Station Program Office at the Johnson Space
Center in Houston, with support from the Earth Science Division of
the Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

For more information on NASA's scatterometry missions, visit:

http://winds.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm

For more information about the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station


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