Last summer, they were considered lost: two Galileo satellites ended in the wrong orbit after their launch by a Soyuz from Kourou, French Guiana. But now the two satellites have been recovered and they should be able to fulfil at least partially their mission – a situation made possible thanks to expertise and hard work in the extended Galileo team, from ESA, to agencies partners and industry.
More about Galileo:
http://esa.int/galileo
The Navigation Support Office is based at ESOC’s Navigation Facility, which provides products and services related to global navigation satellite systems in support of ESA missions and to European customers such as Eumetsat and to worldwide customers through its participation in the International Global Navigation Satellite Systems (IGNSS) Services group.
The core service consists of calculating and predicting highly accurate GPS, Galileo and GLONAS satellite orbits, in near-real time, every six hours, around the clock. These data are then used to improve GPS position accuracy, paving the way to even more sophisticated applications such as scientific studies, large-scale climate monitoring and tracking of long-term changes in Earth’s geology.
More about ESA Navigation Support Office:
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Operations/Ground_Systems_Engineering/ESA_Navigation_Support_Office
How far has Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation system progressed?
Watch this video summary of Galileo’s In-Orbit Validation phase milestones to find out, and learn what happens next.