Satellites View The Oceans and Seas

SEASAT

Seasat was the first satellite designed specifically to monitor the oceans with radar. Launched in 1978, the satellite operated for 98 days and acquired enough data to produce imagery of 100 million square kilometers of the Earth's surface. Seasat orbited the Earth at an altitude of 800 kilometers (about 500 miles), and supplied radar images of many ocean features, including sea ice, currents, eddies, and internal waves. (60k jpg)
1:20 Scale model courtesy of Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Seasat also carried an instrument to measure the topography of the ocean surface. The lighter shades represent rises and the darker areas are depressions. The variations in the ocean surface are reflections of the trenches and ridges on the ocean floor.
Courtesy of Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Imagery from Satellites View The Oceans and Seas section of the gallery:

Imagery, page 1
Imagery, page 2
Imagery, page 3

Radar

Oceans and
Seas Imagery P.1