Earth Science

Workers at the Astrotech processing facility in Titusville prepared for a news media showing of the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-1 (GOES-1). GOES-1 was the first in a new generation of weather satellites deployed above Earth. It was the first 3-axis, body-stabilized meteorological satellite to be used by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and NASA. These features allowed GOES-1 to continuously monitor the Earth, rather than viewing it just five percent of the time as was the case with spin-stabilized meteorological satellites. GOES-1 also has independent imaging and sounding instruments which can operate simultaneously yet independently. As a result, observations provided by each instrument will not be interrupted. The imager produces visual and infrared images of the Earth's surface, oceans, cloud cover and severe storm development, while the prime sounding products include vertical temperature and moisture profiles, and layer mean moisture.