There are natural disasters such as strong storms that cause floods, maritime storms or uncontrolled fires in which observing the evolution is providential both when it comes to sizing the mishap and to draw up a strategy for solutions on the ground. In this scenario, satellites are real lifesavers. So Spain and Portugal are going to launch a “atlantic constellation” of satellites that observe the Iberian Peninsula from space to protect it.
The context. It is not difficult to find catastrophes that have hit the peninsula in recent years, as an example is the train of storms with which we began 2026 and whose effect can be seen from space or the DANA that destroyed Valencia. Currently, the reference satellites for forest management, fires and emergencies in Europe are ESA’s Copernicus / Sentinel, which generate images of the Iberian Peninsula every two or three days.
What is the Atlantic Constellation. It is a set of 16 small satellites, eight launched by each country, which will orbit less than 700 kilometers from Earth, coordinating to generate images of the territory every two or three hours. It is a complement and not a replacement for the European Copernicus Sentinel.
Why is it important. The implementation of the Atlantic Constellation brings an obvious improvement when it comes to evaluating progress and planning solutions to disasters: going from having information every 2 – 3 days to doing it every 2 – 3 hours, practically in real time for this type of disasters.
On the other hand and as explained for El Periódico Nicolás Martín, director of Users, Services and Applications of the Spanish Space Agency, this is a project “very relevant for the Spanish aerospace sector and for our strategic autonomy.” And although its main mission is emergencies and natural disasters, it also has applications for other sectors and entities, such as agriculture.
How are they going to do it? Spain has awarded their part to the Catalan Open Cosmos through a contest. The company will be in charge of designing and manufacturing the state’s eight satellites, while the ICE-CSIC will develop one of the four payloads of each satellite and the geophysical data extraction algorithms. On the Portugal side, it will be GeoSat who leads the project. The ESA will be the one who supervises everything.
On each satellite there will be four instruments: high-resolution multispectral optical cameras to analyze vegetation and terrain, GNSS reflectometry sensors to measure soil moisture or sea state, IoT connectivity and a system to identify and track vessels.
The roadmap. The first demonstration satellite will be called Pathfinder and according to the project schedule, it will be ready by the end of this year. It will be launched in the first half of 2027, thus serving to validate the integrated technologies before manufacturing the rest of the units. However, the full deployment of the entire satellite fleet will take place in the following years.
Cover | Photo of SpaceX
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