The Meteosat Third Generation-Imager2 (MTG-I2) satellite has set out on its journey from France to French Guiana, departing yesterday from Nice harbour.

The satellite, together with support equipment needed on the ground before launch, will be travelling through the Mediterranean then across the Atlantic, before arriving at Europe’s Spaceport in June.

Until now, the satellite has been held in the cleanrooms at Thales Alenia Space in Cannes, France. Thales Alenia Space France leads the industrial consortium for MTG as the overall prime contractor for the MTG mission.

Part of the MTG constellation developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) for Eumetsat, MTG-I2 will launch this summer on Ariane 6 to join the two MTG satellites already in orbit. The mission is designed to produce images in unprecedented detail. It provides completely new data products and capabilities for European weather forecasting, especially suited to nowcasting of severe weather events.

The MTG-Imager satellites carry two instruments: a Lightning Imager and a Flexible Combined Imager.

• The Lightning Imager offers completely new capabilities for European meteorological satellites by continuously monitoring for lightning. By doing this from geostationary orbit, which is at an altitude of about 36 000 km above the equator, it can scan more than 80% of Earth’s surface seen from that viewpoint.
• The Flexible Combined Imager, on the other hand, builds a picture of fast-evolving weather systems and can be used to issue timely weather warnings. It is particularly relevant for air traffic safety. It is able to scan the entire Earth disc in just 10 minutes and can scan Europe and northern Africa every 2.5 minutes.

When MTG is fully operational, it is expected to produce at least 50 times more data than the previous Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) satellites.