missions

GOCE

GOCE (Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer) was an ESA Earth Explorer gravity mission launched on 17 March 2009 ^[1]^[2]. The mission used the Electrostatic Gravity Gradiometer to measure Earth's gravity field in three dimensions while the spacecraft operated in a low, drag-free orbit ^[3]^[4]. ESA declared the end of mission on 21 October 2013 after the spacecraft ran out of fuel, and re-entry followed on 11 November 2013 ^[5]^[1]. GOCE data support static gravity-field and geoid products for ocean circulation, sea-level, geodesy, and solid-Earth applications ^[2].

Full specification

All fields

current status	Ended
operator	European Space Agency
launch vehicle	Rockot with Breeze-KM upper stage
Launched	2009-03-17
actual end of life	2013-11-11
orbit type	Low Earth orbit gravity mission; drag-free operations at about 254 km before lower-orbit campaign
tasking supported	No
archive depth years	4.7
current geographic priority	Global

Supply chain position

carries instrument GOCE Electrostatic Gravity Gradiometer (EGG)

operated by European Space Agency

launched on Rockot with Breeze-KM upper stage

produces data product GOCE Global Gravity Field Models and Grids

Satellite gravity gradiometry → demonstrated GOCE Electrostatic Gravity Gradiometer (EGG)

Sources

[1]GOCE facts and figures, ESAagency doc-2026-06-08
[2]GOCE mission visuals, ESA Earth Onlineagency doc-2026-06-08
[3]GOCE instruments, ESAagency doc-2026-06-08
[4]GOCE operations, ESAagency doc-2026-06-08
[5]ESA's GOCE mission comes to an endoperator press2013-10-212026-06-08

Cite https://eo-atlas.org/missions/goce Markdown twin → Field definitions → Suggest a correction →

How to cite this page

Plain text

GOCE. EO-Atlas, SpectraWorks B.V. https://eo-atlas.org/missions/goce (CC BY 4.0)

BibTeX

@misc{eoatlas:missions:goce,
  title = {GOCE},
  author = {{EO-Atlas}},
  publisher = {SpectraWorks B.V.},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
  url = {https://eo-atlas.org/missions/goce}
}