ESA's Aeolus mission concludes successful trailblazing mission.
The Aeolus mission, which measures global winds from space using a laser, will conclude its nominal operations on April 30, 2023, due to diminishing fuel and increasing solar activity. Despite outliving its predicted lifetime of three years by over 18 months, the mission has been a great achievement, with its data used by major weather forecasting services worldwide. The mission's existing data will still be available to users, and a thorough roadmap has been designed to bring the Aeolus mission to a close, including carefully re-entering the satellite back to Earth.