RELEASE NO: 99-050

LANDSAT 7 STATUS REPORT #2

After nearly one week of being on-orbit, NASA controllers report that the Landsat 7 operations are going according to plan with no problems.

"The spacecraft has been operating extremely well," said Phil Sabelhaus, Landsat 7 project manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. "We have a very healthy spacecraft. We already have received our first images and they look great."

The spacecraft’s first engineering images were taken three days after launch, on Sunday April 18, in a swath from the Dakotas to the Oklahoma/Texas panhandles. An image of Southeastern South Dakota, Northeastern Nebraska region of the U.S. will be released today as part of NASA's Earth Day activities. Landsat 7’s first image can be found at the following address:   http://pao.gsfc.nasa.gov/GSFC/EARTH/PICTURES/Landsat/first7.jpg

During the past few days, the Flight Operations Team and the Flight Support Team have been verifying the performance characteristics and calibrating critical elements of all the spacecraft subsystems. The health of the spacecraft is excellent and the new technology solid state recorder has performed flawlessly. Engineering test burns of the reaction control system are being performed in preparation for underflying Landsat-5 to cross calibrate the instruments.

The spacecraft’s only instrument, the Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus, was put in the outgas mode the day after launch. The prime focal plane was activated and images acquired for the first time on April18. Several images are acquired each day and processed through the Data Handling Facility at the EROS Data Center (EDC) in Sioux Falls, S.D. The images are being evaluated for radiometric and geometric quality after processing by the Image Assessment System at EDC by a team of U.S. Geological Survey and Goddard personnel. Instrument performance has been exceptional. Upon completion of a three week outgasing period the cold focal plane will be cooled and all eight bands of the instrument will be operational.

The Landsat 7 satellite was launched April 15 aboard a Delta II launch vehicle from the Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. Landsat is a dual-agency program between NASA and U.S. Geological Survey. NASA will turn operational control of the spacecraft over to the U.S. Geological Survey on Oct. 1, 2000.

The spacecraft was built by Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space in Valley Forge, Penn. The Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus was built by Raytheon, formerly Hughes, Santa Barbara Remote Sensing in Santa Barbara, Calif.

Landsat 7 is the latest in series that began with Landsat 1 in 1972. This data will provide scientists with new information on deforestation, receding glaciers and crop monitoring. The data also will be available commercially for land-use planning and urban development issues.

Landsat 7 is part of global program known as NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise, a long-term program that is studying changes in Earth’s global environment. The goal of the Earth Science Enterprise is to provide people a better understanding of natural changes. Earth Science Enterprise data, which will be distributed to researchers worldwide at the cost of reproduction, is essential to people making informed decisions about their environment.