The PO.DAAC would like to announce that as of 06:58 UTC on 04 October 2011, the antenna on the AMSR-E instrument on board the Aqua satellite stopped rotating and producing data. AMSR-E became unable to maintain the rotation speed necessary for regular observations (40 rotations per minute), and the radiometer automatically halted its observations and rotation. NASA is currently working with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to assess the condition of the AMSR-E instrument and consider future steps. We will send an update when more information is available.

The sea surface temperature (SST) datasets affected by this event are the:
GHRSST Level 2P Global Subskin Sea Surface Temperature from the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer - Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) on the NASA Aqua satellite

and the

GHRSST Level 2P Gridded Global Subskin Sea Surface Temperature from the Advanced Scanning Microwave Radiometer - Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) on the NASA Aqua Satellite

These data sets are accessible at:
http://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/dataset/REMSS-L2P-AMSRE
http://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/dataset/REMSS-L2P_GRIDDED_25-AMSRE

Additional GHRSST Level 4 datasets that incorporate L2 AMSR-E SST will also be affected in an undetermined manner.

The PO.DAAC will continue to update our users on the AMSR-E situation. Any questions should be addressed to: podaac@podaac.jpl.nasa.gov.


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Physical Oceanography DAAC       Email:   podaac@podaac.jpl.nasa.gov
Jet Propulsion Laboratory       WWW URL: http://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov

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