News
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SUPARCO/FAO issue study on rapid crop damage assessment in Pakistan in 2012 Mon Dec 31 2012Pakistan faced floods and tormenting rains during the last three consecutive monsoons from 2010 to 2012. Experts from UN-SPIDER's Regional Support Office SUPARCO in collaboration with the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) started generating data on a daily basis on flood extent, damage to households, infrastructure crops and undertaking detailed Damage Need Assessment (DNA). In the...
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International Workshop on flood risk mapping using spatial technologies Fri Dec 28 2012Pakistan Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (SUPARCO) - host of one of UN-SPIDER's Regional Support Offices - conducted a five-day training/workshop on “Flood Risk Mapping Using Spatial Technologies” from 5 to 10 December, 2012. The workshop was jointly organized by SUPARCO and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in collaboration with...
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ESA monitors water resources in the Mediterranean from space Fri Dec 28 2012The effects of climate change, population growth and economic development in the Mediterranean are posing a threat to the water supply in the region. As part of ESA’s TIGER initiative, satellite data are supporting water management by identifying water resources. The demand for water is growing around the Mediterranean and is especially crucial in areas that do not receive regular rainfall...
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NASA to launch next-generation communications satellite Thu Dec 27 2012NASA's newest Tracking and Data Relay Satellite, known as TDRS-K, arrived on 18 December 2012 at the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida in preparation for a Jan. 29 2013 launch. TDRS-K arrived aboard a U.S. Air Force C-17 from the Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems assembly facility in El Segundo, Calif. For almost 30 years, the TDRS spacecraft have provided a reliable communications...
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International Charter activated for flooding in England Sat Dec 22 2012Heavy rain swept across the UK over the weekend of 22 and 23 December. This resulted in flooding across the country, particularly affecting south-west England and Wales. The activation of the International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" was requested on 21 December 2012 with the Environment Agency (of England and Wales) being the project manager. As of 24 December, the Environment...
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NASA: Earth at Night imagery reveals wildfires in Australia Thu Dec 20 2012A new map of the Earth at night that NASA published two weeks ago showed the footprint of human civilization on the planet, as revealed by the lights we use to brighten the darkness. The map was built by Earth Observatory designers together with colleagues at the National Geophysical Data Center and made possible by a new NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)...
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EUMETSAT: Dissemination of Meteosat-10 satellite data has started Wed Dec 19 2012On 12 December 2012, EUMETSAT's MSG-3 satellite was declared ready to support the Meteosat operational services and renamed Meteosat-10. On 18 December, the dissemination of Meteosat-10 SEVIRI data and meteorological products has started to the wider user community via EUMETCast-Europe. This is in addition to the National Meteorological Services in EUMETSAT’s Member and Cooperating States...
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Fiji: International Charter again activated in the context of Cyclone Evan Tue Dec 18 2012After two activations of the International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" to provide satellite imagery for the impacts of Tropical Cyclone Evan, the Charter was today again activated in the context of this Cyclone; this time for Fiji. It was activated by UNITAR/UNOSAT on behalf of UNOCHA. Tropical Cyclone Evan hit Fiji at Category 4 strength on 17 December. It is reported to have...
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Hyperspectral data plays important role in environmental monitoring Tue Dec 18 2012In cooperation with Galileo Group, UN-SPIDER's Regional Support Office in Hungary, the Karoly Robert University College, participated in an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) flight operations and hyperspectral data collections for a NASA sponsored project to map sea grass beds and coral reefs in the Florida keys. Hyperspectral data collections can play a crucial role in environmental mapping and...
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International Charter activated for Cyclone Evan Mon Dec 17 2012In the context of Tropical Cyclone Evan, the International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" was activated twice to provide satellite-based emergency maps. The first activation was initiated by UNITAR/UNOSAT on behalf of UNOCHA for Samoa. Tropical Cyclone Evan struck Samoa on 13 December 2012, and made landfall as a Category 1 storm before intensifying to Category 3. The cyclone...
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NASA satellites track Tropical Cyclone Evan over Samoa Fri Dec 14 2012NASA satellites have been monitoring Tropical Cyclone Evan and providing data to forecasters who expected the storm to intensify. On Dec. 13, Evan had grown from a tropical storm into a cyclone as NASA satellites observed cloud formation, height and temperature, and rainfall rates. The Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite passed above intensifying tropical storm Evan in the South...
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Hurricane Sandy: Polar-orbiting satellites were key in pinpointing landfall Fri Dec 14 2012According to a new study by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), the NOAA forecasts of Hurricane Sandy’s track could have been hundreds of miles off without information from polar-orbiting satellites. Rather than identifying the New Jersey landfall location within 30 miles five-days before landfall, the models would have shown Sandy remaining at sea. “This...
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Asia: Floods the most frequent disaster in 2012 Thu Dec 13 2012An early view of disaster trends in 2012 across Asia, the world's most disaster-prone region, shows that mortality from flood events continues to decline but economic losses remain a major cause of concern. In 2012 so far, floods were the most frequent disaster occurring in Asia (44%) and had the highest human and economic impact. They accounted for 54% of the death toll in Asia, 78% of people...
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Turkey to launch Earth Observation Satellite Wed Dec 12 2012The launch of Turkey's Earth Observation Satellite Göktürk-2 is scheduled for 19 December 2012, 18:13 Turkey time. Turkey’s first domestic observation satellite, Rasat, was successfully launched into space in August 2011. The second satellite Göktürk-2 has three times as high a resolution as the first one and is of a mass four times that of Rasat. It will be launched from the Jiuquan base in...
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NASA satellite captures Typhoon Bopha seen from space Wed Dec 12 2012In early December 2012, Bopha made landfall in the southern Philippines as a powerful typhoon. Bopha weakened to a tropical storm after passing over the southern Philippines, but regained typhoon strength over the South China Sea on December 7. On December 8, Unisys Weather reported that Bopha was headed back toward the Philippines. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on...
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United Nations/Japan establish Fellowship Programme on Nano-Satellite Technologies Tue Dec 11 2012The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs and the Government of Japan in cooperation with the Kyushu Institute of Technology (KIT) have established a United Nations/Japan Long-term Fellowship Programme on Nano-Satellite Technologies for nationals of developing countries or countries with economy in transition. The Programme will provide extensive research opportunities in nano-satellite...
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AfricaGIS 2013 Conference in Addis Ababa Mon Dec 10 2012The GSDI Association, EIS-Africa, the International Geospatial Society, and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) continue their partnership in offering the joint GSDI 14 World Conference and AfricaGIS 2013 Conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in November 2013. The theme of the conference is "Spatial Enablement in Support of Economic Development and Poverty Reduction. Pre...
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Japan to host World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction Mon Dec 10 2012The UN General Assembly confirmed that Japan will host the Third World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in 2015 when it passed its annual resolution yesterday on the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction. Previously, Japan successfully hosted the last two such world conferences. The world's first comprehensive framework for disaster risk reduction resulted from the last world...
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UN-SPIDER supports APSCO Training course on Earthquake Monitoring Mon Dec 10 2012In cooperation with the Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization (APSCO) and National Disaster Reduction Centre of China (NDRCC), UN-SPIDER jointly organized a training course on Remote Sensing Data Usage for Earthquake Monitoring and Evaluation. The training taking place at Beijing Normal University, China, started on 3 December and will continue until 13 December 2012. The broad aim of the...
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Galileo: First navigation signals transmitted by FM3 Fri Dec 7 2012Europe’s third Galileo satellite has transmitted its first test navigation signals back to Earth. The two Galileo satellites launched last October have reached their final orbital position and are in the midst of testing. The third Galileo Flight Model, known as FM3, transmitted its first test navigation signal in the E1 band on 1 December, the band being used for Galileo’s freely...
