Cool pictures from the GOES satellite series, a retrospective

GOES-U will be renamed GOES-19 in orbit. All GOES satellites are designated with a letter until they reach geostationary orbit, when they are renamed with a number. After a full checkout of its instruments, systems and data, GOES-U will replace GOES-16 in the GOES East operational position. GOES-16 will then serve as a standby satellite in orbit.

First image of GOES-1, 1975

This is the first image of Earth, taken by the first satellite in the GOES series, GOES-1, on October 25, 1975. South America dominates the lower half of the globe, and the southern part of the United States is visible in the upper left.

GOES-1’s visible-infrared spin scan radiometer provided day and night images of cloud conditions and determined radiation-derived temperatures of the Earth’s atmosphere.

Mount St. Helens, 1980

GOES-3 recorded the eruption of Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980. An explosion on the north face of the mountain ripped off the top 409 m of the volcano. It was the deadliest and most economically devastating volcanic event in U.S. history, causing severe damage to 580 km² of land.

Storm of the Century, 1993

The Storm of the Century, also known as the Blizzard of 1993, swept from Texas across the entire East Coast from March 11 to March 14, 1993. GOES-7 recorded the storm’s path as it wreaked havoc, producing more than four feet of snow in some locations, a destructive derecho (fast-moving bands of thunderstorms with destructive winds), and 11 tornadoes in the state of Florida. The storm caused nearly $5.5 billion in damage.

One of the first images from GOES-16 (GOES-R), 2017

GOES-16 sent its first high-resolution images to Earth on January 15, 2017, including this image of the Western Hemisphere with the Moon hanging above.

The composite color image of the entire disk was created using several of the Advanced Baseline Imager’s (ABI) 16 spectral channels and is an example of the satellite’s advanced technology. The images show a highly detailed view of the Western Hemisphere – with three times more spectral information, four times higher spatial resolution, and more than five times faster temporal coverage than previous generation GOES spacecraft.

Longest single lightning bolt, 2020

GOES-16 captured the world’s longest lightning bolt, the so-called mega-bolt, on April 29, 2020. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) certified it as the longest lightning bolt ever recorded, with a horizontal length of 765 kilometers. The bolt stretched from the central coast of Texas to southern Mississippi, beating the previous record of 719 kilometers for a lightning strike in southern Brazil in 2018.

Timelapse of an iceberg running out of control, 2020

When the giant iceberg A-68A broke off (calved) from the Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica on July 12, 2017, GOES-16 observed it drifting through the South Atlantic Ocean toward the island of South Georgia, one of the world’s largest marine protected areas and an important fishing area. At the time, it was larger than the state of Delaware and one of the largest icebergs in the world. Fortunately, the iceberg rotated clockwise as it approached the island (top right), following the current parallel to the island.

Northern California wildfires, 2021

GOES-17 captured several large wildfires in Northern California on August 3 and 4, 2021. The GeoColor image has a fire temperature overlay that helps identify the heat signatures, or hotspots, of the locations where the most intense fires are raging.

Atmospheric River 2021

On December 1, 2021, GOES-17 tracked an atmospheric river flowing from the Pacific Ocean (near Hawaii) toward the West Coast. In this infrared water vapor image, the darker bluish-green areas are moisture-rich clouds, while the orange areas represent drier air. Atmospheric rivers tend to bring large amounts of precipitation to the area.

Satellite launch, 2022

This is a view of the launch of GOES-T (GOES-18) on March 1, 2022, over its sister satellites GOES West (GOES-17) and GOES East (GOES-16). GOES-T became GOES-18 when it reached orbit and replaced GOES-17 in the GOES West operational position in early 2023. GOES-17 became the standby satellite in orbit.

Eruption of the Hunga Tonga massif, 2022

GOES-17 recorded the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano on January 15, 2022, which caused the largest underwater explosion ever recorded with modern scientific instruments.

It recorded images much faster and at much higher resolution than GOES-3 did when it recorded the eruption of Mount St. Helens.

Solar flare, 2023

GOES-16 observed this magnificent X5 solar flare and coronal mass ejection (CME) on December 31, 2023, with its Solar Ultraviolet Imager (SUVI) instrument. It was the most powerful solar explosion since 2017. Solar flares can cause radio blackouts at Earth’s poles as well as radiation storms.