MOSCOW, March 3 (RIA Novosti) – A Russian space research center has launched a website providing online users with up-to-date satellite imagery of Earth’s weather, the Roscosmos space agency said Monday.
The images are provided by the nearly two-ton Electro-L satellite, which was launched in 2011.
The satellite hovers in a fixed spot above Earth’s equator in a geostationary orbit, enabling it to capture consecutive images of nearly the entire eastern hemisphere.
Photos assembled into a time-lapse video of the past 24 hours are continually updated on the Research Center for Earth Operative Monitoring’s website.
The spacecraft, with a planned lifetime 10 years, is the first of three Russian geostationary meteorological satellites for weather forecasting and scientific research slated for orbit by 2015.
