This image shows the centre of the city of Rome: on the right, the Tiber river flows from north to south, and near the course of the Tiber, we see the white oval of the Olympic stadium at the top-right of the image, then the streets of the Vittoria neighbourhood radiating from piazza Mazzini and, further down along the bend of the river, the famous dome and colonnades of Saint Peter’s basilica and the star-shaped gardens of Castel Sant’Angelo.
The image was captured on 5 March 2025, during a passage over central Italy, by a multispectral optical instrument on board the first IRIDE microsatellite, the Pathfinder Hawk, which was launched on 14 January. The IRIDE constellation of satellites are tailored to provide information for a wide range of environmental, emergency and security services for Italy.
Read full story: IRIDE first image presented at ESA–ESRIN