NOAA officials recently announced details of a new geostationary operational environmental satellite that will launch next week. The satellite, named GOES-N, procured in cooperation with NASA, will lift off Friday, June 24, at 6:13 p.m. (EST) from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. When GOES-N reaches orbit, it will be renamed GOES-13.
GOES-N, the first spacecraft in the new GOES-N/O/P series, will feature a highly stable pointing platform, which will improve the performance of the imager and sounder instruments. GOES-N will also have expanded measurements for the space and solar environment monitoring instruments, a new dedicated broadcast capability to be used by the Emergency Managers Weather Information Network, and a new digital weather facsimile capability for higher quality transmissions of data and products.
“The solar x-ray imager is to space weather forecasting, what satellite imagery is to hurricane forecasting,” said Ernie Hildner, director of the NOAA Space Environment Center, in Boulder, Colo. “It is helping to improve forecasts and warnings for solar disturbances, protecting billions of dollars worth of commercial and government assets in space and on the ground, and lessening the brunt of power surges for the satellite-based electronics and communications industry.”
NOAA’s two operational GOES spacecraft — GOES-12 hovering above the equator in the east, and GOES-10, above the equator in the west — provide continuous environmental observations of North, Central, and South America and surrounding oceans. The satellites supply data critical for fast, accurate weather forecasts and warnings, detecting solar storm activity, relaying distress signals from emergency beacons, monitoring the oceans and scanning the landscape for the latest drought and flood conditions. When GOES-N reaches orbit, it will be renamed GOES-13, and put in a storage mode as a backup to GOES-10 and GOES-12 until it is called into service.
About GOES
GOES satellites provide the kind of continuous monitoring necessary for intensive data analysis. They circle the Earth in a geosynchronous orbit, which means they orbit the equatorial plane of the Earth at a speed matching the Earth's rotation. This allows them to hover continuously over one position on the surface. The geosynchronous plane is about 35,800 km (22,300 miles) above the Earth, high enough to allow the satellites a full-disc view of the Earth. Because they stay above a fixed spot on the surface, they provide a constant vigil for the atmospheric "triggers" for severe weather conditions such as tornadoes, flash floods, hail storms, and hurricanes. When these conditions develop the GOES satellites are able to monitor storm development and track their movements.
NOAA officials recently announced details of a new geostationary operational environmental satellite that will launch next week. The satellite, named GOES-N, procured in cooperation with NASA, will lift off Friday, June 24, at 6:13 p.m. (EST) from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. When GOES-N reaches orbit, it will be renamed GOES-13.
