The joint NASA/JAXA Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) which as retired on 15 April 2015, re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere in the early morning of 16 June 2015 and safely burned up. The mission, which was launched in November 1997 was originally only planned to last three years. In the event it produced over 17 years of valuable data on subtropical rainfall which improved the knowledge base on the world weather system and climate modelling.