Auckland, June 6, 2016

planet labs Blog Posts

A Love Letter to Flock 3p: Happy Three Year Anniversary

Stories

Dear Flock 3p, This Valentine’s Day, we’re celebrating your three year launch-anniversary. Can you believe it?! It was February 15th, 2017 in India and February 14th in San Francisco when you soared to the heavens on the PSLV rocket and spread your solar-powered wings. My how time flies (in space)! Not to […]

Planet’s First Launch of 2020: 26 SuperDoves on a Vega

News

Planet launches every three to six months to keep its constellation of Earth imaging satellites replenished and flying the latest and greatest technologies. Following on the heels of the successful launch of Flock 4p in November of 2019, Planet’s first launch of 2020 will be on Arianespace’s European-made Vega rocket, a first […]

Venturing to Mars on Earth with the Help of Planet Data

Stories

Dr. Anna Grau Galofre of Arizona State University and her colleagues are using PlanetScope imagery to help learn more about life on Mars. Grau Galofre and her team are analyzing the terrain of Axel Heiberg Island in the Canadian High Arctic, with the aim of observing channels carved by melting glaciers. What […]

Wuhan Reacts to Coronavirus, the Taal Volcano Erupts and More

News

Journalists continue to utilize satellite data to inform the public about pressing issues. Here are some examples of how satellite imagery has been used to help monitor important global events. The Phases of Wuhan Reuters utilized satellite data to track the effects that the coronavirus outbreak has had on Wuhan, the capital […]

Rocket Launch Trends Roaring into the 2020s

Tech

It’s never been easier to launch satellites into space, and things are only getting better for satellite operators. A multitude of launch vehicles and orbits are available to satellite missions ranging from Kickstarter-funded garage efforts to serious commercial endeavours. Today, we’re recapping some of the most important launch trends of the last […]

The End of a Decade: The Start of a New Space Era

Tech

Over the last decade, we’ve entered the era of the “Space Renaissance,” a rebirth of space activities that are accelerating innovation. Agile aerospace—a philosophy of spacecraft development that encourages rapid iteration—was largely just a thought-kernel in the minds of aerospace experts 10 years ago, and now it’s an ideal that many in […]

RapidEye Constellation to be Retired in 2020

News

It’s with mixed sentiments that we share that Planet’s RapidEye constellation will be retired at the end of March 2020. After 11 years of faithfully gathering imagery, it has aged gracefully, to say the least. RapidEye has gone above and beyond, making invaluable contributions to our global Earth observation dataset since being […]

2019 Dispatch: Planet’s Year-in-Review

Stories

The year 2019 was an astronomical time for Planet. Twenty SuperDove satellites entered orbit aboard the ISRO’s PSLV-C45 in the spring and 12 more hitched a ride into space in winter, with the latter marking Planet’s 25th successful launch. Since the company’s inception a decade ago, we have launched over 400 satellites […]

NASA Harvest Event Encourages Collaboration for a Sustainable Future

Stories

Leading agriculture companies recognize that the current status quo is not enough when it comes to addressing sustainability and climate change. Historically, there hasn’t been a clear consensus on how to tackle the issues or make measurable progress while increasing productivity to feed 10 billion by 2050. But progress is on the […]