The system is designed to observe stormy regions with a view to detecting TLEs and TGFs as the satellite travels above the phenomena at around 700 km of altitude. A warning is then sent to each of the payload instruments so they can acquire the maximum amount of data during the event.

The trigger phenomenon (sprite detected by a set of photometers for example) only last a few milliseconds, data is actually permanently recorded in a "rotating memory" and the warning dictates which part of the memory will be read. This method is used to access data recorded before the trigger cue to compensate the system's response time.

The satellite memory's massive capacities in telemetry, onboard storage and management will make it possible to accumulate a large amount of data for each event and for a large number of events per day. This is all with a view to satisfying the statistic analysis requirements and being able to correlate the different parameters.

The Scientific Mission Centre has adopted the same plan that was implemented with great success in conjunction with the LPC2E for the DEMETER mission.

Orbit:


Polar, sun synchronous
Altitude 700 km
Ascending node: 22h30


Pointing:


Precision: 0.5° minimum
Altitude restitution: 0.1°
Stability: 0.12° /s
Tracking precision: 5 km


Mission lifetime: 2 to 3 years