Watching Our Oceans

TOPEX/Poseidon Ground Tracks

Sea Surface Height - Global Average from 1993 - 2011.

One of the best ways to understand Earth's ocean is from the perspective of space.

The joint U.S.-European Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich is the next in a line of Earth-observing satellites that will collect the most accurate data yet on sea level and how it changes over time. With ...

Changing conditions in the Pacific have stirred up Earth’s largest ocean and redistributed its heat, piling up warm waters along U.S. Western shores and raising sea level in the process.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifts off from Space Launch Complex 4 at Vandenberg Air Force Base carrying the Jason-3 spacecraft. Liftoff was at 10:42 a.m. PST (1:42 p.m. EST).

OSTM/Jason-2 - Data/ground track animation

Experts from NASA, ESA, EUMETSAT, and NOAA discuss the upcoming launch of Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich in a recorded live broadcast

Karl and Seymour learn how carbon dioxide is formed in this sketch from The Lollygaggers, a global warming sketch comedy.

Our planet is changing. Our ocean is rising. And it affects us all. That’s why a new international satellite will continue the decades-long watch over our global ocean and help us better understand...

For over 20 years NASA has been tracking the global surface topography of the ocean in order to understand the important role it plays in our daily lives. Climate change is causing our Ocean to war...

NASA and its U.S. and international partners have teamed up to launch a new Earth-observing satellite called Sentinel-6B that will measure sea surface height of most of the planet’s ocean. These ob...

This visualization shows total sea level change between 1992 and 2019, based on data collected from the TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1, Jason-2, and Jason-3 satellites. Blue regions are where sea level ha...

Sea levels across the globe are rising as a result of a changing climate — and the rate at which they are rising is accelerating. NASA Science Live was recorded Tuesday, Nov. 17, 2020, and featured...

Earth’s rising seas are some of the most visible signs of our warming planet. Over the last 23 years, NASA satellite missions have observed a steady rise in global sea levels as polar ice sheets me...

It's hard to "see" sea level rise by just looking at the ocean, but its effects are very real.

Recorded live broadcast of Sentinel-6B, launched at 9:21 p.m. PST, Sunday, Nov. 16 (12:21 a.m. EST, Monday, Nov. 17) aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

OSTM/Jason-2 - All instruments plus data animation

Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich will join a long-standing family of Earth observing satellites from NASA and European partners.

Recorded live launch broadcast of Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich

Global sea level rise is accelerating incrementally over time rather than increasing at a steady rate, as previously thought, according to a new study based on 25 years of NASA and European satelli...

NASA and its partners announced the renaming of the mission, previously known as Sentinel-6A/Jason-CS.

TOPEX/Poseidon Instruments

The Jason-3 satellite, launched on January 17, 2016, is allowing scientists to continue a 23-year record of crucial ocean monitoring.

Growing up in landlocked Zimbabwe, NASA JPL engineer Shailen Desai was far from the ocean but still experienced its effects on the climate. Now, he is contributing to an international effort to tra...