Meteor-M was launched on September 17, 2009 from the Baikonur cosmodrome. This is the first of a series of promising spacecrafts created for hydrometeorological support. It is intended to obtain information promptly for the purposes of weather forecasting, monitoring the ozone layer and the radiation situation in the near-Earth space, as well as for monitoring the sea surface, including ice conditions. Created by order of Roscosmos and Roshydromet in FSUE “NPP VNIIEM” (Moscow). It was decommissioned in November 2014. On July 8, 2014, the satellite Meteor-M No. 2 was launched.
The satellite is equipped with two modern panchromatic cameras that receive a black and white stereo image of the Earth in the visible range of the spectrum. The width of the shooting range is 30 kilometers with a resolution of 2,5 meters. The cameras are installed on the satellite with a deviation of + 26 ° and -5 ° along the flight path, which allows simultaneous shooting of the same territory at different angles. This feature makes it easy to create accurate three-dimensional models and digital elevation models in stereo. The cameras are controlled across the flight direction of the satellite, which makes it possible to shoot more often the same terrain. Shooting is made in the range of 500 – 750 nm wavelengths.