Operations with UK-DMC2 satellite data in direct downlink mode are being started in Russia. Respective agreement was signed on 29th August 2011 by the satellite Operator – the British company DMC International Imaging Ltd. (DMCii) and ScanEx Research & Development Center. ScanEx is the first in the world company that will be doing direct data reception from UK-DMC2 satellite to its proprietary network of UniScan™ ground stations. Images from this satellite were available earlier only via the DMCii company.
UK-DMC2 satellite that was put into orbit in July 2009, was developed and produced by the British Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) company, the world leader in creation of small-size spacecraft. The satellite is part of the Disaster Monitoring Constellation group of satellites (constellation of satellites originally designed for monitoring of emergencies but now exploited for many different applications) and has a unique combination of spatial resolution (22 m), spectral bands (green, red and near infra-red) and a wide swath (up to 650 km).
— UK-DMC2 — is not just “another type of data”, but it is a wide swath monitoring system that opens absolutely new possibilities. The main advantage of the UK-DMC2 satellite is the wide coverage of the territory, which ensures reception of coverage on a single pass and high imaging frequency. Such parameters are crucial for solutions in sphere of agricultural monitoring, water bodies monitoring and emergency situation dynamics monitoring (in case of clouds), - explains ScanEx Thematic Department Head Sergei Mikhailov.
The application of UK-DMC2 data is the most efficient during monitoring of dynamically changing sites and phenomena within large areas – at the level of administrative regions. However, UK-DMC2 images fit even better to agricultural solutions related to monitoring with high revisit periods.
— The tasks, for example, of lands inventory can be resolved using data from SPOT and Landsat satellites and some other spacecraft. But tasks that require multitemporal cloud-free image coverage of large areas (e.g. land cover classification) can be much more feasible and manageable with UK-DMC2 wide-swath images. Other tasks as monitoring of crops condition, assessment of damage to agricultural production as a result of natural disasters, monitoring of tillage, sowing and harvesting work, and finally – accumulation of statistic data for yield forecasts can be resolved much more reliably and efficiently using satellite images from UK-DMC2 and from spacecraft having similar sensor specifications: Deimos-1, NigeriaSat-X, — says Sergei Mikhailov.
Testing of data acquisition from UK-DMC2 satellite to the UniScan™ ground station deployed in Russia was successfully conducted in spring-summer season 2011. In their spectral properties the data are applicable to the full extent for calculation of vegetation indices and for application of automatic algorithms of thematic processing. UK-DMC2 undergoes a rigorous and continuous calibration process that ensures radiometry within 1% of Landsat 7.
Operations with UK-DMC2 images in direct downlink mode will enable to considerably increase the operability of working with them and will streamline and make access to data cheaper for interested persons/organizations in Russia and CIS countries. In addition, UniScan™ stations, functioning at public departments, educations institutions, commercial companies, etc. can be upgraded to receive data from UK-DMC2 satellite.
During the 5th International Conference “Earth from Space – the Most Effective Solutions” that is to be held on November 29 – December 1, 2011, in the Moscow Region “Vatutinki” resort hotel, issues of creating small-size RS space satellites will be discussed. Besides, examples of UK-DMC2 images application will be presented and reception of these data in real-time mode to the mobile LAN’ ground station, created based on UniScan™ technology, will be demonstrated.
