So the GOES-R series is NOAA’s
current generation of geostationary satellites
and these are the satellites that are stationed permanently over the U.S..
So that they can constantly monitor
weather and other hazardous environmental conditions for the for the U.S.
and our neighbors throughout the hemisphere.
GOES-U
is in fact the last.
The fourth and final of the GOES-R series.
And we actually have an extra passenger on GOES-U.
We've added to GOES-U a new instrument that's designed to do space
weather monitoring.
The new instrument is called
the compact coronagraph, and it's designed to look at the Sun
and the coronal area around the Sun, specifically for coronal mass ejections.
These are masses, tons really, of charged particles that the Sun ejects.
And if those come towards the earth, they can affect things that people care
about, like electrical power, like radio signals, and G.P.S.
signals.
GOES-U has advanced instrumentation.
It has a camera that can zoom in
and look at dangerous phenomena as often as every 30 seconds.
It's also got a lightning mapper that's designed to look for lightning
activity as often as 500 times a second.
So in combination, those two instruments can look at any kind
of dangerous activity that's happening across the hemisphere, whether that's
tornadoes or floods, ice or snow even looks for
volcanic ash and fires.
Yeah, it's a little like the cycle of life .
GOES-U represents the end of the GOES-R development stage.
But the GOES-U satellite will continue observing
long into the future but it also represents the bridge.
GOES-U will be the bridge that actually takes us
to the next generation of satellites called GeoXo.
Just search for NOAA's
satellites in your browser or on social media.
Yeah, it's important to never run out of weather satellites
and so NOAA's already planning the next generation series called GeoXO.
GeoXO is going to add capabilities, including an ocean color instrument
to look at coastal conditions
and an air quality instrument to look for pollution across the U.S.
So those instruments combined with the the continuity of the current instruments,
will give a very comprehensive view of dangerous phenomena
that might affect the U.S.
and it'll really help us address
the challenges of climate change, things like intensifying hurricanes,
more prevalent harmful algal blooms and more prevalent wildfires.
GOES-U is destined to be our goes East satellite.
That means it'll be stationed off the east coast of the U.S.
From there it can see all of the U.S.
It's also a good spot for it to track areas of the Caribbean and South America.
And it can also see all the way across the Atlantic to Europe and Africa,
which is important because the hurricanes that affect the East Coast
really start out in the Atlantic and come towards us from that direction.
Geostationary is a unique orbit,
the height of the orbit, which is 22,000 miles above the surface of the Earth,
actually puts it so that the rotation rate of the satellite
matches the rotation rate of the Earth.
And so that means that the satellite is always looking at the same place on Earth.
And that's really important if you're trying to watch a storm continuously.
That's what the geostationary orbit does for you.