Improvements on global meteorological observations from the current Fengyun 3 satellites and beyond

The Fengyun 3 (FY-3) series is the second generation of Chinese sun-synchronous meteorological satellites. The first two, FY-3A and FY-3B, were launched successfully on 27 May 2008 and 5 November 2010, respectively. FY-3A and FY-3B share the same design, equipped with 11 payloads to observe the Earth system, but FY-3A is on a monitoring-orbit and FY-3B is on an afternoon-orbit. As a satellite constellation, FY-3A and FY-3B comprehensively improved meteorological observations in spectral wavelength, spatial coverage, and temporal frequency. This paper summarizes the improvements of the FY-3A and FY-3B satellites. New features, including optical imaging capacity from kilometer to hundred-meter resolution, passive microwave imaging, atmospheric temperature and moisture sounding, atmospheric chemistry remote sensing, and Earth radiation budget measurement, are presented with demonstrations of their use. Instruments scheduled for the FY-3C and beyond are introduced as well.