The Monitoring Centre of the North Atlantic, installed in the island of Santa Maria, is already working; it announced today the Regional Secretariat for Housing and Infrastructures.
In the last days, there were received in that station images acquired through satellites of remote observation, which are being prosecuted and distributing as being part of the CleanSeaNet project for the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA).
With capacity at the level of the Earth observation and of the maritime vigilance, this monitoring centre, of the responsibility of the Edisoft, will be going to use the X band of the station of satellites’ tracking of the European Space Agency, installed in Monte das Flores.
Through this centre, it will now be possible, from Santa Maria, to accompany daily, day and night, the trajectories of several satellites of remote observation gathering data for several operational services, such as it is the case of the already announced collaboration between the Edisoft and the Oceanography and Fishing Department, as part of the Ocean Eye project.
In a comment to the fulfilment of the initiative, which he defined like an important “stimulating pole of the investigation and of the science”, the regional secretary for Housing and Equipments said that it was a “historical moment”, not only for the Azores, but also in the Portuguese and European context, which comes to, once more, prove the “centrality of the Azores in the middle of the Atlantic”.
“It is one more step in the consolidation of the aerospace 'cluster' that the Government of the Azores is committed in developing in the archipelago”, it advanced José Contente.
The regional secretary still highlighted the commitment put by the Executive of Carlos César in the location of that station of satellites’ tracking, the only one of the European Space Agency that has capacity to follow rockets.