Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich, the latest in a series of spacecraft designed to monitor our oceans, launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in central California on Saturday, November 21, 2020. The satellite will be followed in 2025 by its twin, Sentinel-6B. Together, the pair is tasked with extending our nearly 30-year-long record of global sea surface height measurements. Instruments aboard the satellites will also provide atmospheric data that will improve weather forecasts, climate models, and hurricane tracking.
The Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite is named in honor of the former director of NASA’s Earth Science Division, Dr. Mike Freilich, who was instrumental in advancing space-based ocean measurements.