The third MSG RAO Workshop E. Oriol-Pibernat MSG Mission Manager GIST, Exeter, 24 October 2006

EOP/S2 Some history about the RAO The joint ESA/Eumetsat Research Announcement of Opportunity (RAO) for for the scientific exploitation of MSG data and products, also in synergy with ERS and Envisat data and products was released to the worldwide scientific community in There were a total of 43 projects selected by a peer review process, covering most of the objectives of the RAO.

EOP/S3 Some history about the RAO The first Principal Investigators Workshop took place in Bologna (I) in May 2000, starting the dialogue between the researchers and ESA/Eumetsat staff. The second Workshop took place in Salzburg (Au) in October It was the first opportunity to present the first results since the start of routine operations.

EOP/S4 The third Workshop The third and last Workshop took place in Helsinki (FI) on the 15 th June It provided scientists the opportunity to present the results of the projects after having access to over two years of data.

EOP/S5 A few pictures

EOP/S6 The program started with a presentation of the GERB programme, followed by the GIST projects presentation. There were in total 21 presentations. The scientific level of the achievements was remarkable, covering scientific studies on e.g. air sea fluxes, cal/val aspects, algorithm development and applications such as: fire/fog detection, contrails, solar energy, UV radiation etc. A book of abstracts was made available for the attendees (over 30 in total), plus ESA/Eumetsat relevant documentation. All presentations have been made available through an ESRIN ftp server.

EOP/S7 Attendees to the Workshop were informed about the successful MSG-2 launch in December 2005 and about the final stages of its commissioning. Thus, it was assured the continuity of the MSG data stream, which was a key issue for keeping their interest in follow-on investigations with the MSG data. Also, those who had reached a mature stage of new applications would be able to put them into operations.

EOP/S8 ESA and EUMETSAT thanked those PIs and co-Is who managed to carry forward their investigations, in spite of the launch delay, and encouraged them to keep using ESA and EUMETSAT data for their future research.

EOP/S9 Third MSG RAO Workshop –The proceedings are available (ESA-SP- 619) both in paper and in a CD ROM. –Copies can be requested to :