NOAA and NASA’s historic launch of the GOES-T satellite was set to take off Tuesday. This new technology will watch over the West Coast, Hawaii, Mexico, Central America and Pacific Ocean.
In our changing climate, it’ll give critical data of atmospheric rivers, fog, hurricanes, and volcanic eruptions. As our wildfire activity increases, it’ll also help locate wildfire hot spots, detect changes in fire behavior, predict the motion of fires, estimate a fire’s intensity, and monitor smoke output and air quality effects from smoke.
GOES-T can identify the lightning strikes most likely to ignite fires and show pyrocumulonimbus clouds, which can be dangerous for firefighters creating erratic winds and even fire tornadoes.
The satellite was scheduled to launch at 1:38 p.m. Pacific time Tuesday from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
Watch the satellite launch on NASA's website.
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