A National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) mission between NASA and the Integrated Program Office of NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) that is named for Verner Suomi (1915–95), recognized by many as the ‘father of satellite meteorology’. The mission supplies multispectral imagery on clouds, land, and oceans and on temperature and atmospheric humidity profiles and ozone distribution. The mission was launched on 28 October 2011, from California, into a Sun-synchronous near-circular orbit at an altitude of 824 km.