Canada's SCISAT Satellite in Full Operation<br /><br />Longueuil, March 11, 2004 - The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) today confirmed<br />the full commissioning of its new SCISAT satellite, launched in August 2003<br />from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The 2-year Atmospheric<br />Chemistry Experiment (ACE) is now underway. A Commissioning Review held on<br />February 27, 2004 at CSA headquarters in Longueuil marked the formal<br />transition from satellite commissioning activities to full science<br />operations.<br /><br />Orbiting the Earth 15 times a day at an altitude of 650 km, the satellite<br />will help Canadian and international scientists improve their understanding<br />of the depletion of the ozone layer, with special emphasis on the changes<br />occurring over Canada and in the Arctic.<br /><br />"SCISAT is truly a great partnership achievement," said Marc Garneau,<br />President of the Canadian Space Agency. The satellite was built by Magellan<br />Aerospace's Bristol Aerospace in Winnipeg and is equipped with scientific<br />instruments made by ABB in Quebec City and EMS Technologies in Ottawa. Led<br />by the University of Waterloo, the science team includes researchers from<br />Environment Canada, the University of Toronto and several other Canadian and<br />foreign academic institutions. "SCISAT partners came together to design a<br />state-of-the-art scientific satellite, once more showing Canada's leadership<br />in atmospheric sciences and small satellite technology," Mr. Garneau added.<br /><br />Furthermore, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada<br />(NSERC) is contributing $1.6 million over five years to the financing of<br />mission preparation studies and results analyses. Among the project's<br />international partners are NASA, which provided the launch, and Belgium,<br />which contributed the array detectors for the on-board cameras.<br /><br />Dr. Peter Bernath, a professor of the Department of Chemistry at the<br />University of Waterloo and Mission Scientist for the ACE mission, said that<br />"The images and data captured by SCISAT are of outstanding quality. The<br />science team hopes to extract significant results from these data."<br /><br />The mission will measure and help understand the chemical processes<br />affecting the distribution of ozone in Earth's upper atmosphere. The<br />mission payload consists of a Fourier Transform Spectrometer and of a second<br />instrument called MAESTRO (for Measurements of Aerosol Extinction in the<br />Stratosphere and Troposphere Retrieved by Occultation). Dr. Tom McElroy of<br />Environment Canada is the principal investigator for MAESTRO, supported by<br />Professor James Drummond of the University of Toronto. SCISAT's first<br />scientific results should be available by the end of the year.<br /><br />- 30 -<br /><br />For more information on SCISAT, please consult the following web page:<br />http://www.space.gc.ca/asc/eng/csa_sectors/space_science/atmospheric/scisat/<br />scisat.asp<br /><br />Subscribe to the Canadian Space Agency News Room and receive by email, on a<br />regular basis, the latest news on the Canadian Space Program. To subscribe,<br />visit: http://www.space.gc.ca/medialist<br /><br />Information:<br /><br />Monique Billette<br />Senior Media Relations Officer<br />Canadian Space Agency<br />Telephone: (450) 926-4370<br />Email: monique.billette@espace.gc.ca