Innovative survive Bi-ocular Animations of Two Oceans

NOAA's GOES-13 and GOES-15 environment satellites assemble 60 degrees apart in a preset orbit over the eastern and western U.S., likewise, given that analyst with a look at the group of weather systems in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The GOES Project at the NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. exposed the arrangement of satellite animations of both GOES-13 and GOES-15 to demonstrate permanent views of both oceans, with conjoined images redolent of binoculars.

 
NOAA's Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites assemble full disk images of the eastern and western faces of the Americas every 3 hours, given that 8 views per day of the clouds over the whole western hemisphere. Overlaid on color maps, the time-series of GOES cloud images give an assessment of the large-scale atmosphere conditions.

Newly, Dennis Chester’s of the NASA GOES Project twisted an algorithm that combined the full disk images from both GOES-13 and GOES-15 (or GOES-EAST and GOES-WEST) into a wide simulation that confirms two rounded images of the Earth and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans as if you were apparent with wide-set eyes.

Getting Ready for the Next Big Solar Storm

In Sept. 1859, on the eve of a below-average solar cycle, the sun unleashed one of the most powerful storms in centuries. The underlying flare was so unusual, researchers still aren't sure how to categorize it. The blast peppered Earth with the most energetic protons in half-a-millennium, induced electrical currents that set telegraph offices on fire, and sparked Northern Lights over Cuba and Hawaii.

"A similar storm today might knock us for a loop," says Lika Guhathakurta, a solar physicist at NASA headquarters. "Modern society depends on high-tech systems such as smart power grids, GPS, and satellite communications--all of which are vulnerable to solar storms."She and more than a hundred others are attending the fifth annual Space Weather Enterprise Forum—"SWEF" for short.

The purpose of SWEF is to raise awareness of space weather and its effects on society especially among policy makers and emergency responders. Attendees come from the US Congress, FEMA, power companies, the United Nations, NASA, NOAA and more. As 2011 unfolds, the sun is once again on the eve of a below-average solar cycle—at least that’s what forecasters are saying. The "Carrington event" of 1859 (named after astronomer Richard Carrington, who witnessed the instigating flare) reminds us that strong storms can occur even when the underlying cycle is nominally weak.

GOES Satellites Capture Holiday Weather Travel Conditions

Travelers over the long holiday weekend can count on one Christmas present: great satellite data from the GOES series of satellites to help them in their travels. Data from the GOES-13 and GOES-11 satellites were used to create a full image of the continental U.S. on Dec. 23 at 1145 UTC (6:45 a.m. EST) as travelers make their way across the country to their holiday destinations. GOES-13 and GOES-11 are the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites that monitor the nation's weather for the U.S. GOES satellites are operated by NOAA, and images and animations are created at the NASA GOES Project at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

The GOES-11 satellite is stationary over the western U.S. and provides imagery of that half of the country in addition to visible and infrared images of the eastern and central Pacific Oceans. GOES-13 covers the eastern half of the nation and the Atlantic Ocean. The holiday travel image combines data from both of these satellites. The image showed a large area clouds from the U.S. southwest stretching north. Those clouds are associated with a low pressure area currently over Colorado. The storm system affecting the Southwest is forecast to move eastward and slide off the coast. It could then track north along the coast and bring some heavy winter weather to coastal areas from the Carolinas northward. Travel could be affected particularly Sunday and Monday along the U.S. East coast from this storm system.

NOAA will be tracking the storm and issuing forecasts over the weekend as the low moves. On Thursday, Dec. 23, the GOES image showed clouds over eastern New England that are associated with a low already out to sea and taking rain with it. In the upper Midwest and Southern Plains states a short wave of energy is going through the region. Some snow showers are forecast for Thursday night, Friday and Saturday in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Snow is forecast in Kansas City, Missouri on Friday, while some sun and flurries are expected on Christmas day. Areas of the Midwest should also be on guard for freezing rain, sleet and snow over the weekend.

NASA Awards Radiometer And Ground System Contracts For JPSS

NASA has awarded two sole source contracts on behalf of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for the common ground system and a scientific instrument on the first Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS-1). JPSS is the restructured civilian portion of the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) that will make afternoon observations as it orbits Earth. The system includes the satellites and sensors supporting civil weather and climate measurements and a shared ground infrastructure with the Department of Defense weather satellite system. JPSS-1 is expected to be ready for launch in 2014.

The Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument contract has been awarded to Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems of El Segundo, Calif. This is a cost-reimbursement contract of approximately $314 million with a period of performance through September 2018. Under this contract, Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems will design, manufacture, test and deliver two VIIRS instruments. VIIRS will gather data on a wide range of Earth's properties, including the atmosphere, clouds, radiation budget, clear-air land and water surfaces, and sea surface temperature.

The Common Ground System contract has been awarded to the Raytheon Corporation of Aurora, Colo. This is a cost-reimbursement contract of approximately $1.4 billion with a period of performance through September 2018. Under this contract, Raytheon will design, manufacture, test and deliver hardware, software, and related services for the mission operations of the JPSS ground system. NOAA is responsible for the JPSS program. NASA is the program's procurement agent, and the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., is the lead for acquisition. Data and imagery obtained from JPSS will increase the timeliness, accuracy and cost-effectiveness of public warnings and forecasts of climate and weather events, reducing the potential loss of human life and property.

NOAA, NASA: Water Vapor Largely Answerable For Global Warming

An increase in atmospheric water vapor is answerable for at least a 3rd of the average temperature increase since in the early hours 1990s, say scientists at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Susan Soloman, the valued climate scientist who led the research, says that this finding doesn’t destabilize man-made global warming theories. "Not to my mind it doesn't," she added. Susan Soloman did point at that the research does allude to human emissions having a much smaller role in climate change than earlier thought, and serves as a caveat to climate modelers who "over-interpret the results from a few years one way or another." In spite of Soloman's personally held belief, the NOAA study is expected to give further ammunition to climate skeptics working to draw public attentiveness to perceived flaws in man-made global warming theories.

Susan Soloman, in interviews with both the Associated Press (AP) and The Guardian, refused to comment on the negative publicity climate science has received lately due to the IPCC Himalaya error and Climategate, and to what the NOAA water vapor report might mean to skeptics and climate scientists alike. Susan Soloman did mention that lots of scientists are now accepting, testing, and sometimes embracing skeptic research and that the NOAA report is evidence of that. "What I’ll say is that this shows there are climate scientists around the world who are trying very hard to understand and to explain to people openly and honestly what has happened in the last decade." Susan Soloman co-chaired the last climate change assessment report prepared by the United Nations IPCC, but did not personally supervise the controversial Himalayan section.

Susan Soloman said it was not clear if the drier atmosphere, which the NOAA report says is the reason global warming fell flat over the last decade, is a natural process or came to be owed to human emissions. If the latter is true, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions would really be responsible for a negative feedback that cancels at least a few of the warming it causes by pushing water vapor towards the surface of the earth and out of the stratosphere, where it acts as a potent greenhouse gas. According to the report, a 10 percent decrease in atmospheric water vapor and no-one else was responsible for a 25 percent drop in predicted temperature increase.

NASA Confirms Water Vapor Study

NASA researchers as well as climate scientists all over the world have reviewed the NOAA water vapor research beforehand to its recent publication in the journal Science, one of the most respected in the world. Describing the consequence of water vapor on atmospheric temperature as "enormous," researcher Mr. Andrew Dessler said that "everyone agrees that if you add carbon dioxide (CO2) to the atmosphere, then warming will result. The real question is how much warming?" A Texas A&M researcher functioning in conjunction with NASA, Andrew Dessler pointed out that warmer air can contain higher amounts of water vapor, which might create a runaway optimistic feedback cycle.

The research, facilitated by a state-of-the-art NASA satellite codenamed AIRS, put forward that water vapor is responsible for twice the global warming effect of carbon dioxide (CO2), both man-made and naturally occurring. Whilst this theory was has been carried by climate change skeptics for a short time, global warming advocates dismissed them, saying that water vapor in the atmosphere was just a feedback effect caused by human emissions. NASA scientist Mr. Eric Fetzer says that the new study created models much more accurate to past events than those previously used by climate change advocates, also proves that "water vapor is the big player in the atmosphere as far as climate is concerned."