On the 17~(th) of September, a few weeks before the 6th anniversary of the launch of the Metop A satellite, Metop B, the second of the 3 Metop satellites, has been launched by a Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. This paper presents the main activities which have been performed in the weeks following the launch, to thoroughly verify the satellite behaviour and performance, in order to achieve a fully operational status of the platform and avionics, opening the way to the instruments verification. All spacecraft subsystems were found to operate with very good results and margins. This phase has then been followed by the detailed verification and calibration of the various instruments, which constitutes the last step before the satellite full entry into service. Metop B, like its predecessor Metop A, is part of a series of 3 satellites developed by Astrium as Prime contractor for ESA and Eumetsat. These satellites are operated by Eumetsat, and are the first European satellites dedicated to operational meteorology flying in polar orbit at an altitude of 830 km. Metop A has been providing data since October 2006, and will now operate in tandem with Metop B. The Metop satellites design is based upon the Astrium Spot family of platforms, flown more than 10 times through successive versions, for civilian and military European satellites. Metop uses the last platform version adapted to the highly complex payload made of 11 different instruments, leading to an overall satellite mass over 4 tons. The Metop B satellite has been injected into orbit with a very high accuracy, and its first operations were accomplished nominally through and automatic sequence fully piloted by the satellite central computer. This first part of the Launch and Early Operations (LEOP) phase was fully nominal, and all critical operations like the deployment of the solar array and its orientation towards the sun, as well as the deployment of 5 antennas were accomplished flawlessly. This allowed to enter into the commissioning of the satellite subsystems, to verify in details all the functional chains, whilst gradually starting the instruments activation. Taking benefit of the experience acquired with Metop A, preliminary instruments data started to be distributed a few weeks after launch. Full instruments verification and calibration continued over several months, before the satellite was declared operational by Eumetsat.
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