Seven months ago, a NASA satellite launched into space with the goal of mapping global soil moisture. Since that initial venture, the floating mechanism has lost the use of its radar, one of the satellite’s two science instruments.
WHAT HAPPENED TO NASA’S SMAP MISSION?
The radar is part of NASA’s Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission, which launched on January 31st. Costing $916 million, it continues to provide the space agency with imperative measurements to help scientists understand the relationship between energy, carbon cycles and Earth’s water, according to Space Daily. The information is especially crucial as the Earth increasingly experiences climatic variations and unpredictable fluctuations due to the effects of climatic change and global warming.
Most importantly, SMAP will enhance our ability to understand and predict the onset of natural weather hazards, such as droughts and floods. The mission, however, may also provide data for several “practical applications,” such as crop yield predictions and more accurate weather forecasting. To date, the SMAP mission has collected over four months of data, and on April 21st, it also released its first global maps of soil moisture.
According to Financial Express, the radar stopped transmitting on July 7 due to an amplifier problem. On Aug. 24th, NASA attempted to restore the device to no avail. Since that failed attempt, the space agency announced in a statement that the instrument was not recoverable.
Regardless, operations will continue to take place: “Although some of the planned applications of SMAP data will be impacted by the loss of the radar, the SMAP mission will continue to produce valuable science for important Earth system studies,” stated Dara Entekhabi, SMAP Science Team lead at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge.
In the meantime, scientists are planning on releasing data on beta-quality soil moisture towards the end of September. Whether or not the technical malfunction will impede this proposal remains a question left to be answered.
