GOES-18 was launched in March and replaced GOES-17 as one of NOAA’s two primary geostationary satellites.
NASA, NOAA, and industry representatives implemented mitigation steps for GOES-17’s Advanced Baseline Imager cooling-system deficiency that shortened GOES-17’s anticipated lifespan.
NOAA provided GOES-18 ABI data to GOES West data users from 2022-08-01 to 2022-09-08, and from 2022-10-13 to 2022-11-16, through a data interleave with GOES-17 products.
GOES-17 will be moved to a central location between GOES East and GOES West to serve as a backup for the operational constellation now that GOES-18 is operating as GOES West.
The GOES-R Series Program includes GOES-R (GOES-16, launched in 2016), GOES-S (GOES-17, launched in 2018), GOES-T (GOES-18), and GOES-U which is scheduled to launch in 2024.
GOES-18 replaces GOES-17 as GOES West at a location 22,380 km above the equator over the Pacific Ocean.
Once GOES-18 takes over as GOES-West, GOES-17 will move into on-orbit storage at 105 degrees west.
GOES-T will replace GOES-17 at the GOES-West orbital location in geostationary orbit at 137 degrees west.
GOES-18 will be rushed into service to replace GOES-17 because GOES-17’s Advanced Baseline Imager experienced problems.
NOAA is accelerating GOES-T’s move to operational West position so National Weather Service meteorologists can obtain Advanced Baseline Imager data sooner to help backfill data lost by GOES-17 during warm periods.
Soon after launching GOES-17 in 2018, NOAA discovered a blockage in the loop heat pipe that restricted coolant flow to GOES-17’s Advanced Baseline Imager.
GOES-S launched in March 2018 and became GOES-17, operating from the GOES West slot at 137 degrees west in geostationary orbit.
GOES-T is scheduled to launch in January 2022 and will replace GOES-17 because of problems with GOES-17’s Advanced Baseline Imager.
On 2021-07-23, the Advanced Baseline Imager and the Magnetometer on GOES-17 were restored and began delivering data.
Engineers overcame the loop heat pipe issue on GOES‑17 and GOES‑17 delivered 98% of its intended data.
The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite GOES-T will replace GOES-17 in the GOES West orbital position because GOES-17’s Advanced Baseline Imager experienced problems.
NOAA upgraded its Hurricane Weather Research and Forecasting computer model for the 2020 hurricane season to ingest data from GOES-16 and GOES-17 as well as NOAA-20, Suomi NPP, Himawari-8, Metop spacecraft, and COSMIC-2.
NOAA no longer needs space weather data from GOES-14 because GOES-16 is generating more advanced space weather data and GOES-17 provides space weather data in a developmental system.
GOES-15 operated in tandem with GOES-17 at the GOES-West orbital location at 135 degrees west longitude.
GOES-17 launched in 2017.