A selection of several GOES ABI loops during 2022 and 2023 showcased the diverse range of features observed, which included volcanic ash plumes, hurricanes, convection, fog, smoke, fires, dust and ice. It’s very hard to choose just one event from every month of the year, but the goal here is to show a variety of phenomena and locations that... Read More

The GOES (Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite) have been around since 1975, although there were earlier non-operational versions operated by NASA, such as ATS, which carried UW/Madison’s Verner Suomi‘s Spin-Scan Cloudcover Camera. The ATS was followed by the SMS, which carried an early version of the VISSR.To prepare for the 50th anniversary of GOES,... Read More

Cold air over the Great Lakes (see the plot of 850-mb temperature from RAOB stations at 1200 UTC below; note the similarity in temperatures and wind speeds over the Great Lakes states) means Lake Effect Snow. The animation above (source) shows snow bands over western lower Michigan and also downwind... Read More

GOES-18 Airmass RGB imagery, above, from 1500-1820 UTC on 28 October, show light snow over much of central Alaska as a storm system moves into the state. Temperatures at 500 mb, below, derived from NUCAPS profiles (as shown in the toggle), show a tongue of warmer air positioned with the cloud feature (shown as white) in... Read More