GOES-R: Better Forecasts And Earth VisualizationThrough Improved Data

The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-R) series continues and expands upon the legacy the existing GOES system currently operating over the Western Hemisphere. The GOES-R series of imagers are much improved in terms of temporal, spectral, and spatial resolution, providing imagery and derived product data over thunderstorms, hurricanes, and other events as rapidly as every 30 seconds. In preparation for GOES-R, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) operated GOES-14 in an experimental rapid scan 1-minute mode during parts of 2014, 2015, and 2016. This experimental scan mode is called Super Rapid Scan Operations for GOES-R (SRSOR) and emulates the high temporal resolution sampling of the mesoscale region scanning of the Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) on the next generation GOES-R series. These data are helping better prepare users for ABI which will be able to routinely acquire mesoscale (nominally 1,000 km x 1,000 km) images every 30 seconds (or two separate locations every minute). These data offer a glimpse into the future and the improved measurements of the ABI on GOES-R. The improved spectral resolution will be demonstrated by imagery from the already on-orbit Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) on Japan's Himawari-8, the second in the series of ABI instruments to be constructed. AHI imagery will be compared to data from co-located GOES-like instruments to showcase AHI's and ABI's improvements over the current generation. A recently developed Educational WebApp will be introduced to demonstrate high-time resolution imagery for a number of phenomena. Derived products, such as cloud properties and mask, satellite-derived winds, fire detection, and simulated natural color imagery will be showcased. The Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM), which provides an entirely new capability for total lightning detection (cloud and cloud-to-ground flashes), will also be demostrated. The GLM will map total lightning continuously day and night with near-uniform spatial resolution of 8 km with a product latency of less than 20 sec over the Americas and adjacent oceanic regions. When used together, the combined information from the ABI and GLM will offer many new opportunities to visualize the earth-atmosphere system.