Plans for NOAA's Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) System

At this writing (June 25, 1999), the GOES constellation consists of three satellites. NOAA’s GOES-8 is operational at 75 degrees West longitude as GOES-East, GOES-10 is operational at 135 degrees West as GOES-WEST, and GOES-9 is in a dormant standby mode at 105 degrees West ready for immediate, but limited, activation when needed to replace GOES-8 or GOES-10. GOES-10 was activated from storage in July 1998 when GOES-9 exhibited signs consistent with the near term failure of its attitude-controlling momentum wheels. The next satellite, GOES-L ir ready for launch but is on hold due to a flight constraint on our vehicle because of the Delta-III launch failure on May 4, 1999. When the failure investigation is complete and the flight constraint is removed, GOES-L will be launched from Cape Canaveral to ensure continuity of full, two-GOES coverage of the hurricane season, severe weather, and the following winter storm season. After checkout, GOES-L will become the on-orbit spare satellite. GOES-M, planned for launch in 2002, will carry the first geostationary Solar X-Ray Imager (SXI) instrument. SXI was developed by NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, and will image the sun every few minutes in four X-Ray energy ranges. Manufacture of the follow-on series, GOES N through Q, is in progress under new contracts. Evolution of Imager channels is an important feature, and will be described. Planning has begun for a series of advanced Imagers with a number of additional channels and advanced Sounders with greatly improved accuracy based on interferometer technology. Weather forecasters use of GOES qualitative and quantitative data is increasing and is improving many operational forecasts. New applications of quantitative data, now being tested in operational numerical models, are expected to add to the accuracy of model products already using Sounder radiances from GOES-8 and GOES-10. Descriptions will be presented for these features and other upcoming events.