Portuguese satellites enabling real-time maritime navigation service launched

Six Portuguese satellites were launched to create a civilian and military use maritime navigation service. Four satellites will create the Lusíada Constellation and join one that is already in orbit. The other two now launched, an Air Force SAR satellite (Synthetic Aperture Radar) and an optic satellite (VHRLight NexGen) will join the Atlantic constellation, joining the other three already in orbit.

The Minister of Economy and Territorial Cohesion Castro Almeida claimed that "this is the most striking day" of Portugal’s presence in space, "but it is just the beginning, because other satellites will follow suit this year and we will have our own launcher in the Azores. The six satellites were launched from California, United States today via a SpaceX rocket.

All of these satellites were developed and produced in Portugal. The first four (named after writers) by companies within the New Space Portugal Mobilising Agenda, one by the Air Force, and one by CEiiA – The Engineering and Development Centre and were funded by the Recovery and Resilience Facility.

The Minister noted that "we all remember when we looked at the country that dared make it to space. It was only the large countries, the rich ones and Portugal was completely out of this. Now, Portugal is an active partner and wants to be in the front line of interacting with space".

Castro Almeida stressed that thi dual use capability, civilian and military, is a way of Europe investing in its defence: "We want to be part of boosting Europe’s military capabilities, and this is a way of doing so. The military expenditure with reaching space will evidently count as Portugal’s set of military expenditure ".

"And Portugal is playing a decisive role, an active and leading role in this process of boosting military use capabilities in Europe", he said, indicating "a new era in Portugal’s connection to space".

Lusíada Constellation

The Lusíada Constellation, which is the Portuguese part of the Atlantic Constellation, will be setting up a real-time information service for vessels, such as the ones that exist for roads, with information such as pirate and weather alerts, requests for help, floating icebergs, oil spills...

The system will enable any vessel at sea to access communications at affordable rates. The first data will be available after three months, but the service will only be fully operational in 2027 when the 12 satellites making up the constellation are in orbit.

Atlantic Constellation

The Atlantic Constellation will boost dual use capabilities to serve Portugal and Europe. The data collected can be used in the fields of defence, security, disaster response, precision agriculture, environmental monitoring, carbon mapping. The event was transmitted live from the Knowledge Pavilion in Lisbon, attended also by the Secretary of State for Science and Innovation Helena Canhão.

Portugal and ESA invest €15 M in the Santa Maria Space Hub