“The currency of the future is water, and it’s those types of spacecraft that are needed to understand and help utilize it the right way.” The equipment is so sensitive that it will detect water level ...

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite before dawn on Wednesday (Dec. 16) from Space Launch Complex-4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

An animation of the SWOT satellite unfolding its 5-meter long antennae. Gif: NASA / CNES We live on a blue planet. More than 70% of Earth’s surface is covered by water, and a soon-to-launch ...

The SWOT satellite (its name is short for Surface Water and Ocean Topography) launched into space from Vandenberg Space Force Base in central California aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 on Dec. 16.

Even the satellite itself is international. NASA collaborated with France’s space agency (CNES) on SWOT, and Canada and the UK also worked on the satellite.

Engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) designed KaRIn to scan all large bodies of water on Earth. That includes oceans, freshwater lakes larger than 15 acres (62,500 square meters ...