Together with ground stations in Barrow/Fairbanks and Wallops in the United States, provided by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the European Earth Terminal in Usingen constitutes the Jason-3 earth terminal network, allowing contact with the satellite during each orbit and the timely processing and dissemination of near-real-time products to the operational user community.

The antenna and radome were provided by French electronics company ELTA under a contract from the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES), the French space agency. The infrastructure was built by German company Media Broadcast under a contract from EUMETSAT. ELTA was scheduled to complete the installation of all terminal equipment on 16 September.

Scheduled for launch in April 2014, Jason-3 will ensure continuity in the measurement of rising sea levels carried out by Jason-2, Jason-1 and TOPEX/Poseidon over the last 19 years. Jason-3 is a joint programme between EUMETSAT, NOAA, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and CNES.

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