Originally Posted by
iquitos
Why does airbus have a satellite and what does it use it for?
Airbus Group (formerly EADS - European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company) includes a bunch of different companies. "Airbus Defence and Space" includes the former Astrium, which provides satellites, launch services and satellite services.
So these are ordinary Earth-observing satellites that normally provide images for military or civil use; they've just been paying specific attention to data coming back from the search area lately. This WSJ article explains a bit:
http://stream.wsj.com/story/malaysia...8/SS-2-491978/