The first of two satellites in a billion-dollar NASA-European project to precisely measure rising sea levels, a major consequence of global warming, streaked into orbit from California Saturday atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
By timing how long it takes cloud-penetrating radar beams to bounce back from the ocean 830 miles below, the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite can track sea levels to an accuracy of less than half an inch to help scientists chart the ongoing effects of global warming over extended periods.
Named after the late director of NASA’s Earth Science Division, “it’s the satellite so nice we built it twice,” said project scientist Josh Willis at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Five years from now we’ll launch its successor, Sentinel-6B.”
A Falcon 9 rocket climbs away from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, boosting the first of two satellites into orbit to monitor rising sea levels.
NASA
“This is a huge deal for us climate scientists, because it means we get to look at the oceans for a full 10 years in an unbroken record,” he said. “And it’s the first time we’ve been able to build two in a row so that we can launch them back to back and extend the record much farther than we’ve been able to so far.”
The satellite’s Falcon 9 rocket roared to life at 12:17 p.m. ET and shot away from launch complex 4-East at Vandenberg Air Force Base northwest of Los Angeles, climbing to the south toward an orbit tilted 66 degrees to the equator.
It was the California rocket builder’s 22nd Falcon 9 flight so far this year and its 103rd overall including three triple-core Falcon Heavy boosters. It was the first Falcon 9 launch from Vandenber since June 2019.
After powering through the dense lower atmosphere, the first stage fell away, flipped around and flew itself back to a landing near the launch pad to chalk up SpaceX’s 66th successful stage recovery, its fourth in California.
The second stage, meanwhile, carried out two engine firings to put the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite in its required orbit.
A camera on the Falcon 9’s second stage captures a spectacular view of of the rocket’s first stage falling away as it heads for a landing at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, far below.
SpaceX
The Sentinel-6 satellites will continue a decades-long effort by NASA, the European Space Agency, the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to monitor sea levels over the past 30 years.
With the launch of Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich and Sentinel-6B, those measurements will be extended into the 2030s. And the data collected so far is alarming to climate researchers.
“You can see the rate of rise is actually increasing,” Willis said. “So in the 90s, sea level was rising at about two millimeters per year. In the 2000s, it was more like three millimeters per year. And now it’s more like four or close to five millimeters per year.”
The first stage makes a pinpoint landing, chalking up SpaceX’s 66th successful booster recovery, its 21st on land and third at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.
SpaceX
More than 90% of the heat trapped by greenhouse goes into warming the world’s oceans.
“So the oceans warm, the water expands, that’s about one third of sea level rise, the rest is from melting glaciers and ice sheets that are reacting to the warming environment,” Willis said. “So these missions really give us our most important yardstick for measuring climate change and how it’s playing out on the planet.”
Along with measuring sea levels around the planet, the new satellite also will monitor temperature and humidity in the lower atmosphere as well as the higher-altitude stratosphere using an instrument that measures atmospheric effects on signals broadcast by navigation satellites.
An artist’s impression of the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite in orbit.
NASA
But the primary mission is monitoring sea levels across 90 percent of the world’s oceans.
“The dynamic balance that persisted before the industrial revolution has been upset by the almost instantaneous combustion of huge reserves of carbon as our society has developed,” said Craig Donlon, the European Space Agency project scientist.
“We see evidence of this dramatic change in many different measurements … but they all point the same direction: the Earth is warming. And the greatest indicator of this Earth system imbalance is sea level rise.”
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
