ESA's Arctic Weather Satellite (AWS) is a novel mission to demonstrate the ability of polar-orbiting satellites to improve short-time forecasts and nowcasts of Arctic weather. Although the payload consists of a state-of-the-art microwave radiometer, the mission is designed in a cost-effective manner and, if successful, will serve as a blueprint for the Sterna constellation of satellites, which is under consideration by EUMETSAT. The AWS was launched in August 2024 and this highlight paper describes the mission, the radiometer and the state of the mission towards the end of the commissioning phase.

Obtaining a better understanding of how the fire-perturbed atmosphere may ignite more fuel is important to firefighters, but it is also a topic of interest for the general public. If large enough, fires can grow by feeding themselves. Atmospheric measurements during a fire can help scientists and firefighters better understand how the fire will evolve and whether there is a risk that the fire will run out of control. The authors show that using sonde measurements during the fire enables firefighters to better predict how it will evolve, thereby improving their security. At the same time, such measurements provide a valuable dataset for scientific model testing and development.

A large part of non-CO2 greenhouse gas emissions originates from area-distribute sources, such as from agriculture and wetlands; however, methods to quantify such emissions are much less mature than for well-studied point sources. This study addresses the above challenges by using an airborne eddy-covariance approach, which is cutting-edge science requiring high-fidelity instrumentation and advanced statistical techniques. Waldmann et al. demonstrate that aerial emissions can be quantified with similar uncertainty as point source emissions. Detailed methodology satisfies the need for transparency in data acquisition and analysis to quantify emissions. Observations like those described in this paper will help us reduce uncertainties in the impacts of agriculture on the atmosphere, allowing governments to develop smart policy that simultaneously protects food security and environmental health.