Sea Satellite

A polar orbiting, earth observation satellite designed to gather information about the oceans. Although the satellite only operated in 1978, much of its synthetic aperture radar data is still useful.

Seasat was the first Earth-orbiting satellite designed for remote sensing of the Earth's oceans and had onboard the first spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR). The mission was designed to demonstrate the feasibility of global satellite monitoring of oceanographic phenomena and to help determine the requirements for an operational ocean remote sensing satellite system. Specific objectives were to collect data on sea-surface winds, sea-surface temperatures, wave heights, internal waves, atmospheric water, sea ice features and ocean topography.