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Forecasters will soon be able to see real-time mapping of lightning activity on Earth and keep a closer eye on solar storms that unleash the sun thanks to a new weather satellite.
Together, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration launched GOES-U, or the Geostationary Operations Environmental Satellite mission, on Tuesday.
The weather satellite lifted off aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 5:26 pm ET. The launch was broadcast live on NASA’s website. Weather conditions in Florida were 60% favorable for launching at the start of the launch window.
GOES-U is the fourth and last satellite in the R Series of Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites, “the most sophisticated weather and environmental monitoring system in the Western Hemisphere,” according to NOAA.
“The GOES-R series of satellites is a game changer for us,” Ken Graham, director of NOAA’s National Weather Service, said during a news conference Monday. “Since the series was first launched in 2016, the latest generation of GOES has enabled new and improved forecasting and warning services to help save lives and protect property.”
When GOES-U reaches geostationary orbit, or a circular orbit above the Earth’s equator, the satellite will be renamed GOES-19, or GOES East. The satellite will replace GOES-16, the former GOES East satellite launched in 2016, and will work alongside GOES-18, also known as GOES West. In the meantime, the GOES-16 satellite will essentially serve as an on-orbit backup for the system in case one of the satellites goes down.
Together, the GOES-18 and GOES-19 satellites will collect atmospheric, solar, climate and ocean data and cover more than half the globe from the west coast of Africa to New Zealand.
What sets GOES-U apart from other satellites is that it carries a new capability to track space weather.
Solar activity tracking
As the sun approaches solar maximum – the peak in the 11-year cycle, which is expected this year – it becomes more active. Researchers have observed increasingly intense solar flares and coronal mass ejections erupting from the sun’s surface.
Coronal mass ejections consist of large clouds of ionized gas called plasma and magnetic fields emitted from the sun’s outer atmosphere.
When these outbursts are directed at Earth, they can cause geomagnetic storms, or large disturbances in the Earth’s magnetic field. With these events, there is always the possibility of disruption to communications, the electrical power grid, navigation, and radio and satellite operations.
The most intense solar storm to affect the Earth in 20 years happened on May 10, but fortunately it only happened that auroras were shining over states that never see the northern lights.
The increased activity of the sun causes auroras that dance around the Earth’s poles, known as the northern lights, or aurora borealis, and southern lights, or aurora australis. When the energetic particles from the coronal mass ejections reach the Earth’s magnetic field, they interact with gases in the atmosphere to create different colored lights in the sky.
GOES-U carries multiple instruments that will improve the detection of space weather hazards, including the Compact Coronagraph-1 that can detect solar flares and coronal mass ejections, as well as define the size, velocity, density and direction of these solar storms.
The coronagraph will provide continuous observations of the solar corona, or the warm outer layer of the sun’s atmosphere, which is where space weather events originate, said Elsayed Talaat, director of NOAA’s Office of Space Weather Observations.
The instrument’s capabilities will enable NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center to issue warnings and watches one to four days in advance and “mark a new chapter in space weather observations,” Talaat said.
The Compact Coronagraph-1 is the world’s first ever operational satellite coronagraph to better monitor the sun, said Steve Volz, assistant administrator for NOAA’s Satellite and Information Service.
“This new instrument will provide our forecasters at the Space Weather Prediction Center with images of the sun’s corona within 30 minutes, compared to the previous time of about eight hours,” said Graham. “Geomagnetic storms can affect our infrastructure here on Earth by jeopardizing our power grid, communications, navigation systems, aviation and space-based assets. Better and faster observation will help us better alert our infrastructure providers and potential hazards so they can take action.”
Lightning strikes in real time
From orbit, GOES-U will monitor weather, climate and environmental hazards across North, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west coast of Africa.
From its unique vantage point, GOES-U will be able to spot tropical storms, send alerts to forecasters as storms form in the Atlantic Ocean, and provide near real-time tracking and monitoring.
The satellite carries a suite of science instruments, including imaging and mapping technology, which will enable it to capture valuable data on hurricanes, including high-level wind speeds, distinctive features under the eye of the hurricane and lightning activity, and can all help better forecasters. understand potential risks.
GOES-U will be the first operational lightning mapper flown in geostationary orbit. As storms develop, they tend to show spikes in lightning activity. A better understanding of how storms develop and grow can help meteorologists better predict whether storms will cause flooding, produce hail, cause wind damage or spawn tornadoes.
The lightning mapper will take pictures of Earth at a rate of 500 times per second to track lightning like never before, Sullivan said.
The main camera on GOES-U can zoom in to track dangerous weather and environmental conditions as often as every 30 seconds, a capability that enables better warning systems, said Pam Sullivan, director of the GOES-R program. for NOAA.
Forecasters can also use GOES-U instruments to identify wildfire risks, including hotspots, intensity, smoke output and air quality impacts, and even data that can help trackers of fire motion predict. The satellite can also use its lightning mapper to determine which lightning strikes are most likely to ignite wildfires.
Other environmental hazards GOES-U can track include real-time images of fog and low clouds that could affect air and sea travel, as well as detecting volcanic eruptions and ash and the sulfur dioxide emitted by volcanoes. GOES-U will also be able to monitor fluvial atmospheric events, or large parts of the Earth’s atmosphere that carry moisture from the equator to the poles, which can cause floods and mudslides.
In addition to early warning of hurricane formation, GOES-U can collect climate data on the Earth’s oceans such as marine heat wave signals and sea surface temperatures, which affect the marine food chain and may predict bleaching events lead to corals.
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