# Meteosat-12
*missions*

## Specifications
- **operator**: eumetsat
- **actual launch**: 2022-12-13
- **current status**: operational
- **orbit type**: Geostationary orbit; prime 0 degree longitude Meteosat service
- **revisit days**: 0.006944
- **tasking supported**: false
- **current geographic priority**: Europe, Africa and surrounding oceans from the 0 degree geostationary service
- **launch vehicle**: arianespace-ariane-5
- **entity type**: mission
- **last verified date**: 2026-06-14
- **verified by**: agency-doc
- **claim status**: agency-sourced
- **provider**: eumetsat
- **attributes**: {"operator":"eumetsat","actual_launch":"2022-12-13","current_status":"operational","orbit_type":"Geostationary orbit; prime 0 degree longitude Meteosat service","revisit_days":0.006944,"tasking_supported":false,"current_geographic_priority":"Europe, Africa and surrounding oceans from the 0 degree geostationary service","launch_vehicle":"arianespace-ariane-5"}

## Editorial
Meteosat-12 (also designated MTG-I1, the first Meteosat Third Generation Imager) is operated by EUMETSAT and was launched on 13 December 2022 into geostationary orbit at 0 degrees longitude. The satellite carries the Flexible Combined Imager (FCI), which provides full-disk Earth imagery every 10 minutes across 16 spectral channels at higher spatial resolution and more bands than its MSG predecessors, and the Lightning Imager (LI), which detects lightning continuously over Europe and Africa during day and night. FCI Level 1 data became operational in December 2024, and Meteosat-12 assumed prime geostationary service duty for Europe, Africa, and surrounding oceans in June 2025. The mission supports weather nowcasting, atmospheric motion vector derivation, sea surface temperature retrieval, thermal anomaly detection for wildfire monitoring, and optical transient detection via the Lightning Imager. [^meteosat12-prime][^eumetsat-mtg-data][^mtg-fci-guide]

## Compositional position
- Meteosat-12 --[mission_payloads]--> fci (products)
- Meteosat-12 --[mission_payloads]--> li-mtg (products)
- Meteosat-12 --[related-topic]--> weather-nowcasting (topics)
- Meteosat-12 --[related-topic]--> atmospheric-wind (topics)
- Meteosat-12 --[related-topic]--> wildfire (topics)

## Sources
- [meteosat12-prime] | Meteosat-12 begins prime service duty | https://www.eumetsat.int/meteosat-12-begins-prime-service-duty | tier=agency-doc | accessed=2026-06-14
- [eumetsat-mtg-data] | Using Meteosat Third Generation data | https://user.eumetsat.int/data/satellites/meteosat-third-generation | tier=agency-doc | accessed=2026-06-14
- [mtg-fci-guide] | MTG FCI level 1c data guide | https://user.eumetsat.int/resources/user-guides/mtg-fci-level-1c-data-guide | tier=agency-doc | accessed=2026-06-14

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Source: https://eo-atlas.org/missions/meteosat-12
Maintainer: SpectraWorks B.V. (CC-BY 4.0)