One of the things that I really wanted to do when in Hessen was take a tour of the European Space Agency main operations control centre! Sadly their tours were booked out for the next year or something, so I was pretty stoked to find out that EUMETSAT (the organisation for the exploration of meteorological satellites) still had places on their tour. The office is located about ten minutes walk away from the main train station in Darmstadt.

There were probably around 20 or so people (mostly OAPs) on the tour which (after a security check) took us along the outside to show us the replicas of their satellites which are standing in the just outside. We were then led in through the doors across a mini bridge over a false stream (plus pond with carp which looked like a lair out of a James Bond movie) up to a conference room. The next hour or so was spent listening to a talk about the organisation and what they do. Its pretty basic information, interesting for those who have no idea of the kind of work that goes on. For those that do – well I was more fascinated by control offices that the room overlooked and the hundreds of working computer screens flickering in the background. I would have adored to see the kind of work that goes on behind the scenes from a little closer – although not too in depth, the modelling and algorithms used are way beyond my comprehension levels! It was kind of cool as I did recognise a program they use to create figures which I frustratingly battled for a few months working on climate modelling in college (I was quite proud of the outcome/figures of that project despite all the work that went into it). I love the images produced from this kind of satellite data and the organisation was kind enough to provide a commonly seen print or two (and some free pens and bags which disappeared under a scramble of OAPs plus me – free stuff makes people go mildly crazy) to the people on the tour. It was interesting, if a little less hands-on than I had hoped, so its worth the visit if you’re in the area and don’t know too much about the area. Note that it was in German, I don’t think they offer it in English and if you’re not up for listening to a longish presentation (one little old lady remarked that she’d had a nice nap) it might not be the right kind of tour for you.