The Data Relay Test Satellite (DRTS) "Kodama" and the Earth Observation Satellite "Midori-II" have carried out the first inter-satellite communications test.

DRTS, which is in a geo-stationary orbit, transferred on real-time basis from Midori-II successfully data to the Earth Observation Center (EOC), a ground station in Saitama prefecture, Japan. At that time the low-earth orbiting Midori-II was at a location, where the EOC ground station could not receive the satellite data directly.

The image was acquired at 14:00 (JST) on February 20, 2003. It shows the snow-covered Tibet plateau, the sub-continent of India and the island of Ceylon. The image is a so called 'true color composite', which renders colors similar to those as seen by the human eye, using GLI spectral channel 22 (660 nm) in red, channel 21 (545 nm) in green and channel 20 (460 nm) in blue. The spatial resolution of each pixel is 250 m.