Arctic Lakes

A banner explaining the purpose of the SWOT mission, created and displayed during testing.

SWOT leaving NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, en route to March Air Reserve Base in Riverside County, California. Once the scientific payload arrived, it was sent to a Thale...

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) Open House visitors are delighted to see how well their color-coded stickers match the "sea surface topography" model of the Gulf Stream within a wooden box.

Arctic

A diagram illustrating the swaths of data that SWOT will collect. 

A photograph of the Varzea Forest area of Brazil (4 of 4).

Part of the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite's science instrument payload sits in a clean room at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory during assembly.  

A photograph of the Varzea Forest area of Brazil (2 of 4).

The SWOT satellite observatory is being jointly built by NASA and Centre National D’Études Spatiales (CNES).

Canada is home to more than 30,000 lakes including these water bodies in Northern Alberta. The abundance of surface freshwater in Canada makes it a prime target for AirSWOT investigations.

Soccer Nets on a levee in the Amazon

Mounted above the Payload Module, the Spacecraft Bus is a multi-purpose platform housing many of the electronics required for the observatory to function, including components for power, propulsion...

Disappearing lakes in Barrow, Alaska.

A photograph of the Varzea Forest area of Brazil (1 of 4).

Engineers integrate separate parts of the SWOT satellite into one in a Thales Alenia Space clean room facility in Cannes, France.

Pictured are team members who helped load the hardware for the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite's research instruments onto a C-17 airplane pose for a picture. The payload left M...

Lake Calado, Amazon

SWOT's nominal coverage during its 3-year science orbit will include measurements between 78°N and 78°S collected over a period of 21 days. Maps show the coverage after 3 days (left) and the full 2...

Highly visible in their red shirts, SWOT project team members - including Project Manager Parag Vaze at left - interact with the public during the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) "Open House" ...

NASA has selected Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, California, to provide launch services for SWOT.

The first 90 days of the SWOT science mission will be flown in a "fast-sampling" phase that revisits specific areas once per day. This phase will begin after a 90-day commissioning phase for engine...

This SWOT "Bannerbug" exhibit was created for display during hardware tests conducted during an eleven-day period in October 2008.

A photograph of the Varzea Forest area of Brazil (3 of 4).

AirSWOT is using parts of Saskatchewan as a testing ground for mapping water levels.

A view of SWOT from inside a U.S. Air Force C-17 aircraft, as it was being loaded en route to Thales Alenia Space near Cannes, France.