missions

Sentinel-3A

Sentinel-3A is an ESA-operated Copernicus Earth observation satellite for ocean, land, ice, inland-water, and atmosphere monitoring. It launched on 2016-02-16 and remains in extended operation as of 2026-06-14.^[1]^[2] The spacecraft flies in a near-polar sun-synchronous orbit with an 814.5 km reference altitude, 98.65 degree inclination, and 10:00 descending node.^[3]

The Sentinel-3A payload includes OLCI, SLSTR, SRAL, and MWR.^[4] Its observation pattern is systematic monitoring rather than user tasking. Sentinel-3A has a 1,270 km swath and a two-day paired revisit with Sentinel-3B; its archive spans about 10 years as of 14 June 2026.^[3]^[4]

Named with

In the same stories

EUMETSAT Operator · named together · 2 stories
Ocean and Land Colour Instrument (OLCI) Instrument · named together · 2 stories

Full specification

All fields

current status	Extended operations
operator	European Space Agency
launch vehicle	Rockot with Breeze-KM upper stage
Launched	2016-02-16
orbit type	Near-polar sun-synchronous orbit, 814.5 km reference altitude, 98.65 degree inclination, 10:00 descending node
swath km	1270
tasking supported	No
archive depth years	10
current geographic priority	Systematic global ocean, land, ice, inland-water, and atmosphere monitoring under Copernicus

Supply chain position

carries instrument SLSTR (Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer)

carries instrument Ocean and Land Colour Instrument (OLCI)

operated by European Space Agency

launched on Rockot with Breeze-KM upper stage

Land-surface temperature - emissivity retrieval → demonstrated SLSTR (Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer)

Thermal anomaly detection → demonstrated SLSTR (Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer)

Sea-surface temperature retrieval → demonstrated SLSTR (Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer)

Multispectral optical imaging → demonstrated SLSTR (Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer)

Thermal infrared imaging → demonstrated SLSTR (Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer)

Ocean colour / water-leaving radiance → demonstrated Ocean and Land Colour Instrument (OLCI)

Sources

[1]Sentinel-3 facts and figures, ESAagency doc2026-06-14
[2]Sentinel-3, Copernicus Sentinel Onlineagency doc2026-06-14
[3]S3 Mission, SentiWiki Copernicusagency doc2026-06-14
[4]Sentinel-3, EUMETSATagency doc2026-06-14

Cite https://eo-atlas.org/missions/sentinel-3a Markdown twin → Field definitions → Suggest a correction →

How to cite this page

Plain text

Sentinel-3A. EO-Atlas, SpectraWorks B.V. https://eo-atlas.org/missions/sentinel-3a (CC BY 4.0)

BibTeX

@misc{eoatlas:missions:sentinel-3a,
  title = {Sentinel-3A},
  author = {{EO-Atlas}},
  publisher = {SpectraWorks B.V.},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
  url = {https://eo-atlas.org/missions/sentinel-3a}
}