GOES-18 IFR Probability Fields now operational
GOES-18 became the operational GOES-West satellite at 1800 UTC on 4 January. The toggle above shows the GOES-West (labeled as GOES-17, but the 1806 UTC image is using GOES-18 satellite information) IFR Probability Fields before/after the changeover. The IFR Probability field gives more useful information about surface visibility/ceiling restrictions than (for example) visible imagery (shown here) that shows widespread cloudiness at the time. There are noticeable changes between the 1756 and 1806 UTC fields, likely because the numerical model output used in GOES-R IFR Probability fields will change every hour, that is (in this case) at 1800 UTC.
The toggle below shows the airmass RGB from GOES-17 at 1756 and from GOES-18 at 1806 UTC over the same domain; note that stripes at 1756 UTC (an artifact of Loop Heat Pipe issues in GOES-17) are not present at 1806 UTC in the GOES-18 imagery.
