European Space Agency taps ICEYE to ‘revolutionise’ disaster management
Global satellite and monitoring specialist ICEYE is to collaborate with the European Space Agency (ESA) to develop the next generation of Earth Observation insights, which it believes could “revolutionise disaster and crisis management from the vantage point of space”.
ICEYE operates the world's largest fleet of commercial synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) satellites. It has been selected as a partner by the ESA to participate in the Civil Security from Space Programme (CSS).
This is the first CSS Partnership contract to be signed under the CSS programme and aims to develop an advanced suite of natural catastrophe monitoring services.
Under the three-year partnership, ICEYE and ESA will collaborate on the "Disaster Management from Space" project to develop a comprehensive suite of Disaster Management Solutions for effective natural catastrophe management, and an imaging service underpinned by ICEYE's fleet. The partnership will drive the evolution of ICEYE's hazard insights, while designing and testing the next-generation of Earth observation technology.
Josef Aschbacher, director general of ESA, said: "I am delighted to sign the first ESA Partnership Project with ICEYE under the Civil Security from Space Programme, supporting European efforts to use space to monitor, mitigate and resolve civil security and crisis events to keep people, infrastructures and resources safe on Earth. We look forward to working with our Finnish partner on this project."
Rafal Modrzewski, CEO and co-founder at ICEYE, said: "This partnership is an opportunity to test the boundaries of natural catastrophe monitoring solutions, alongside ESA. The CSS programme demonstrates ESA and the European Space Sector's commitment to building community resilience. We are proud to have been selected to participate in this programme, and to be at the forefront of the new space-based crisis observation and management era."
The CSS programme is a new ESA multi-disciplinary programme started in November 2022 to propel the integration of Europe's competencies and assets into monitoring, mitigating and resolving civil security and crisis events. The programme offers European industry the opportunity to maximize the use of space capabilities in addressing challenges in civil security and crisis management.
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