This website works best with a newer web browser such as Chrome, Firefox, Safari or Microsoft Edge. Internet Explorer is not supported by this website.

CIMSS Satellite Blog

MENU

Welcome to Space, Artemis II!

By Tim Wagner •

For the first time since the early 1970s, humans are on their way to the moon. A partly cloudy sky over Cape Canaveral and Florida’s Space Coast provided a perfect backdrop for GOES-19 mesoscale imagery. Watch the True Color RGB imagery as the most powerful rocket that NASA has ever... Read More

For the first time since the early 1970s, humans are on their way to the moon. A partly cloudy sky over Cape Canaveral and Florida’s Space Coast provided a perfect backdrop for GOES-19 mesoscale imagery. Watch the True Color RGB imagery as the most powerful rocket that NASA has ever built shoots eastward across the Atlantic and towards its lunar destination.

The 3.9 micron channel, normally used for fires, can also be used to track the rocket in flight as long the solid rocket boosters and main engines are firing. This loop is the same time and area as the true color image above, but the rocket is shown as the large, rapidly moving dark (hot) spot.

This is also an interesting application for GOES CSPP Level 2 products. Here’s the cloud height product for shortly after launch. The plume is easily over 10000 m right after launch according to this algorithm.

On 6 April 2026, the astronauts will fly around the moon and be further from Earth than any humans have ever been.

View only this post Read Less

Satellite signatures of the Artemis II launch

By Scott Bachmeier •

Overlapping 1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sectors provided 30-second imagery from GOES-19 (GOES-East) to support the launch of Artemis II — and Rocket Plume RGB images created using Geo2Grid (above) displayed both the initial hot thermal signature of the NASA Space Launch System (SLS) Core Stage rocket booster near the Kennedy Space Center launch site (brighter red pixels: 2235 UTC) in... Read More

30-second GOES-19 Rocket Plume RGB images, from 2234-2241 UTC on 01 April [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

Overlapping 1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sectors provided 30-second imagery from GOES-19 (GOES-East) to support the launch of Artemis II — and Rocket Plume RGB images created using Geo2Grid (above) displayed both the initial hot thermal signature of the NASA Space Launch System (SLS) Core Stage rocket booster near the Kennedy Space Center launch site (brighter red pixels: 2235 UTC) in addition to the later high-altitude thermal signature of moisture-laden rocket exhaust (brighter shades of green: 2239 UTC) as the spacecraft moved quickly eastward away from Florida after launch at 22:35:12 UTC on 01 April 2026.

Multi-panel displays of GOES-19 imagery (below) revealed that reflectance and/or thermal signatures of the SLS rocket booster and its condensation plume were apparent in all 16 ABI spectral bands.

30-second GOES-19 images of all 16 ABI spectral bands, from 2234-2237 UTC on 01 April [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

A GOES-18 (GOES-West) Mesoscale Domain Sector was also positioned over the launch area — and in spite of a much of a much larger satellite viewing angle (69 degrees, vs. 36 degrees for GOES-19), reflectance and/or thermal signatures of the SLS rocket booster and its condensation plume were also seen in all 16 ABI spectral bands from GOES-18 (below).

1-minute GOES-18 images of all 16 ABI spectral bands, from 2234-2237 UTC on 01 April [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

A larger-scale view of 1-minute GOES-18 Water Vapor imagery (below) tracked the thermal signature of the SLS Core Stage booster exhaust as it approached the eastern limb of the satellite view at 2341 UTC.

1-minute GOES-18 Upper-level Water Vapor (top), Mid-level Water Vapor (center) and Low-level Water Vapor (bottom) images, from 2234-2241 UTC on 01 April [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

30-second GOES-19 True Color RGB images (below) showed the SLS rocket booster’s condensation cloud as it initially arched northeast away from the Florida coast — but wind shear soon began to deform that cloud feature.

30-second GOES-19 True Color RGB images, from 2234-2248 UTC on 01 April [click to play animated GIF]

Plots of rawinsonde data from Jacksonville, Florida (below) showed the wind shear that was present along the east coast of Florida on the day of the launch.

Plots of rawinsonde data from Jacksonville, Florida at 1200 UTC on 01 April and 0000 UTC on 02 April [click to enlarge]

View only this post Read Less

1-minute GOES-18 images to monitor the potential of heavy rainfall and flooding across American Samoa

By Scott Bachmeier •

During a period when American Samoa had been under a prolonged Flood Watch, the Weather Service Office at Pago Pago requested that a GOES-18 (GOES-West) Mesoscale Domain Sector be positioned over the region (due to their lack of radar). 1-minute Infrared imagery with GLM Flash Points (above) displayed deep convection with intermittent lightning activity... Read More

1-minute GOES-18 Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images with an overlay of 1-minute GLM Flash Points (white dots), with plots of METAR surface reports (cyan), from 0801-1800 UTC on 29 March [click to play MP4 animation]

During a period when American Samoa had been under a prolonged Flood Watch, the Weather Service Office at Pago Pago requested that a GOES-18 (GOES-West) Mesoscale Domain Sector be positioned over the region (due to their lack of radar). 1-minute Infrared imagery with GLM Flash Points (above) displayed deep convection with intermittent lightning activity that moved southward across the main island of Tutuila (where Pago Pago, METAR identifier NSTU, is located) and the smaller Manu’a Islands (~65 miles to the east) during a 10-hour period on 29 March 2026. The development of rain showers and thunderstorms was enhanced by the presence of a surface trough of low pressure that was draped across the Samoan islands (surface analyses: 0600 UTC | 1230 UTC | 1500 UTC | 1800 UTC).

Rawinsonde data from Pago Pago (below) revealed that the atmosphere was rather moist and unstable, with parameters that were favorable for the development of deep convection. The coldest cloud-top infrared brightness temperature exhibited by storms in the vicinity of NSTU was -78ºC — which represented a small overshoot of the Most Unstable (MU) air parcel’s Equilibrium Level (EL).

Plot of rawinsonde data from Pago Pago, American Samoa at 1200 UTC on 29 March [click to enlarge]

Although rainfall across American Samoa on 29 March was not exceptionally heavy (and no Flash Flood Warnings were issued), there was a period when NSTU received 1.11″ of rain within about 2 hours as a thunderstorm with moderate rain showers passed over Tutuila (below).

List of decoded surface reports from Pago Pago (NSTU), with a red box highlighting the period (in Local Time) that 1.11″ of rainfall occurred within about 2 hours on 29 March [click to enlarge]


List of METAR reports from Pago Pago (NSTU), with a red box highlighting the period when 1.11″ of rainfall occurred within about 2 hours on 29 March [click to enlarge]

View only this post Read Less

Vertically-propagating standing wave clouds downwind of the Coteau des Prairies in South Dakota

By Scott Bachmeier •

1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Visible, Water Vapor and Infrared images (above) showed the development of vertically-propagating standing wave clouds over far northeastern South Dakota on 28 March 2026 — initiated by strong SW winds interacting with the topography of the Coteau des Prairies.The coldest cloud-top infrared brightness temperatures of the standing wave cloud... Read More

1-minute GOES-19 Visible (0.64 µm, left), Water Vapor (6.9 µm, center) and Infrared (10.4 µm, right) images from 1346-2300 UTC on 28 March — with hourly plots of surface wind barbs (white) and 30-minute peak wind gusts (cyan/yellow/red) [click to play MP4 animation]

1-minute Mesoscale Domain Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Visible, Water Vapor and Infrared images (above) showed the development of vertically-propagating standing wave clouds over far northeastern South Dakota on 28 March 2026 — initiated by strong SW winds interacting with the topography of the Coteau des Prairies.

The coldest cloud-top infrared brightness temperatures of the standing wave cloud features were around -45ºC — which roughly corresponded to the 300 hPa pressure level (or an altitude just below 9 km), according to rawinsonde data from Aberdeen SD (below).

Plot of rawinsonde data from Aberdeen SD at 1800 UTC on 28 March [click to enlarge]

A toggle between the GOES-19 images at 1600 UTC and topography (below) included plots of surface wind barbs (white) and RAP model 850 hPa wind barbs (beige) at that time. This helped to visualize the strong flow across the higher terrain that was responsible for generating the standing wave clouds immediately downwind of the Coteau des Prairies (the terrain elevation along the eastern edge abruptly drops from about 2.0 kft to around 1.1 kft — making the formation mechanism of these cloud features similar to those that develop along the coast of northeastern Minnesota).

GOES-19 Visible (0.64 µm, left), Water Vapor (6.9 µm, center) and Infrared (10.3 µm, right) images at 1600 UTC on 28 March — compared to topography [click to enlarge]

Wind gusts across and to the lee of the Coteau reached the 60-70 mph range (below).

Topography image with plots of wind gusts in the 60-70 mph range on 28 March [click to enlarge]

1-minute GOES-19 True Color RGB images from the CSPP GeoSphere site (below) revealed the quasi-stationary nature of the orographically-forced wave clouds.

1-minute GOES-19 True Color RGB images, from 1350-2300 UTC on 28 March [click to play MP4 animation]

View only this post Read Less

  • last_page First
  • Last last_page

Search blog