Meteosat-7 and its predecessors were the first generation of earth observation dedicated geostationary satellites located at 36000 km above the intersection of the Equator and the Greenwich Meridian. Although superseded by MSG-1 (renamed Meteosat-8) in 2005, Meteosat-7 remained as back-up at 0o longitude until 14th June 2006. Meteosat-7 will be moved to 63oE longitude to continue coverage of the Indian Ocean and take over from Meteosat-5. Meteosat-7 was launched by the European Space Agency and operated by Eumetsat. This dataset collection contains visible, water vapour, thermal and infra-red images of the North Atlantic Ocean, Europe and North Africa from the Meteosat geostationary satellite. Images are archived from 11th November 1999 to June 2006. These images are public. Data were collected every half hour in three wavelength channels for visible, infra-red and water vapour images.

Meteosat Second Generation is operated by EUMETSAT and provides almost continuous images to meteorologists and researchers in Europe and around the world. It incorporates significant enhancements in frequency and resolution to the previous generation of Meteosat. MSG measures in 12 spectral channels (compared to only 3 on the previous Meteosat) and records data in a 15 minute cycle (30 minutes on the previous Meteosat). The resolution of the high-resolution visible light channel measures 1 km at the sub-satellite point (compared to 2.5 km on the previous Meteosat). This dataset collection includes visible, infra-red, water vapour, High Resolution Visible (HRV) images and the derived cloud top height, cloud top temperature, fog, snow detection, and volcanic ash products. These images are available for a range of geographical areas. Images are available from March 2005 onwards at a frequency of 15 minutes (some are hourly) and are at least 24 hours old. The different geographic extents for images within this dataset collection are available via the linked documentation 'MSG satellite imagery product geographic area details'. Each MSG imagery product area can be referenced from the third and fourth character of the image product name giving in the filename. E.g. for EEAO11 the corresponding geographic details can be found under the entry for area code 'AO' (i.e West Africa).