On Monday this week, 30 days before the scheduled launch of Sentinel-2B, flight director Pier Paolo Emanuelli reported that the <a href="http://www.esa.int/About_Us/ESOC/Ground_segment_preparing_for_launch" rel="nofollow">‘ground segment’</a> – the hardware, systems and networks used on Earth to control the satellite in orbit – is ‘green’ for launch.

Liftoff is scheduled for 7 March at 01:49 GMT on a Vega rocket from Kourou, French Guiana. The mission control team at ESA’s mission control centre in Darmstadt, Germany, will take over control of Sentinel-2B about 58 minutes later.

In Darmstadt, final <a href="http://www.esa.int/About_Us/ESOC/Launch_campaign" rel="nofollow">prelaunch activities</a>, including simulation training and readiness tests, are in high gear as the centre counts down to Europe’s newest <a href="http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-2" rel="nofollow">Copernicus satellite</a>.

In the photo, Pier Paolo Emanuelli discusses Sentinel flight operations with ESA’s head of operations, Paolo Ferri, in the main control room at ESOC.

Credit: ESA/P. Shlyaev, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO