Transcript

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hi welcome to the goes-t virtual nasa
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social i'm alison tankersley here at
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kennedy space center where we just had
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the atlas 5 ula rocket roll out to the
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pad joining me is dan lindsey dan you
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are the program scientist with noah what
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is your job so my job is that yeah my
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job as the program scientist is to uh
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after the rocket reaches its orbit and
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begins sending back data it's to figure
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out how to use that data in order to do
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the job that noah has so for example we
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get data from the advanced baseline
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imager the geostationary lightning
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mapper
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then what happens next how do we take
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that data and give it to our colleagues
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at the national weather service and
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other private forecasting companies and
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how do they use that to better warnings
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better forecasts so i sort of lead the
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coordination of some of that science
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that's awesome so i know there is
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definitely a lot of data with this
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rocket what does that data show us
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specifically
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firm goes
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so uh some examples of some really cool
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things that you can see from goes first
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of all once after we launch and go into
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uh geostationary orbit after a couple
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months we'll move over to the goes west
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position which is over the east pacific
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ocean that gives us a really good view
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of the western united states so we see
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things uh you know that happen in
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california and one example is wildfires
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we've all heard about many many
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wildfires over the last couple of years
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especially and the advanced baseline
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imager has the capability of detecting
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the hot spots from those wildfires so
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sometimes we're even able to see the hot
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spots from satellite before the fires
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get reported by the public and this is
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important because then we can alert the
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emergency managers who can then go out
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and sometimes they can put out the fires
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ahead of time so that's something that
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we really didn't anticipate as being you
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know so helpful ahead of time since it's
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not really a weather capability itself
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that's definitely amazing and see how
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it'd be helpful is there any other data
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as you would say have been a surprising
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product like this one sure yeah
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something else we didn't expect is so
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the geostationary lightning mapper is
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another instrument of course it detects
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lightning it's the first time we've been
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able to uh see lightning uh constantly
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over the the entire hemisphere really um
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and so one thing we've noticed is
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sometimes when meteors come into the
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into the earth's atmosphere they produce
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lots of light so it sort of tricks the
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instrument and the instrument thinks
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that it's lightning and so for example
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um the weather service up in pittsburgh
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just a couple of months ago they had
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people calling in and saying we saw a
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really bright flash and heard a boom
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what could that be and so what they did
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was take a look at the geostationary
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lightning mapper data and they saw a
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signal and they said oh that is a meteor
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and so then they were able to explain to
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the public you know what was the flash
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and uh and what was the boom
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well that's definitely a surprising
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product and you used a word right there
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a lot geostationary can you tell us what
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does that mean sure so geostationary is
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a special orbit such that we're a little
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more than 22 000 miles above the equator
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and the reason we're at that specific
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altitude is the earth
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spins at the same rate that the that the
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satellite orbits and so you're able to
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always look at the same place at the
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same time
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and the reason this is important is you
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can take an image or take a picture
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every few minutes say every 10 minutes
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or so and it's sort of like time lapse
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photography from space is once you take
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those images and you put them together
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in a series it makes a movie and you can
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see the clouds move so for example you
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can see a hurricane spinning you can see
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the wildfires advancing you can see
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thunderstorm clouds building and that
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that really is the unique capability and
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the critical
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importance of having geostationary orbit
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that's wonderful thank you so much jan
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for joining us we're so excited for this
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launch and now i'm joined by chrissy
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hurley a warning coordination
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meteorologist with noaa in nashville hi
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christy hello and what do you do with
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the goes data well we do many different
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things we monitor it for aviation
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weather fire weather severe weather but
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the biggest thing is where the ghost t
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satellite is going to be positioned it's
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going to be across the eastern pacific
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ocean so it's going to have coverage
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across the western half the united
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states alaska hawaii guam and what's so
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important about that is weather moves
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west to east so we need that data where
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we don't have much across the pacific
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ocean now we don't have observing
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systems where we didn't know what the
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temperature and what not across the
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ocean is or whether balloon launches on
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top of the water so the go satellite
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fills in those data gaps to really help
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improve forecast and model output that's
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awesome and can you tell me what is an
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atmospheric river
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and how does that help with the goes
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forecast well we monitor many different
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things in a national weather service
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operations forecast setting and one of
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those is atmospheric river so think
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about you know a river on the ground on
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the surface but up in the atmosphere so
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it's taking moisture from one location
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to another and you know atmospheric
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river is kind of the buzzword right now
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we had one
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this winter where lake tahoe got four
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feet of snow that was the atmospheric
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river so we're able to monitor the
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location of those atmospheric rivers
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where that moisture is going to be
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and
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then be able to tell where you know
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chances of higher flooding you know
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increased chances of higher snowfall
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will occur well we definitely want to be
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prepared for that and how does goes data
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improve over time
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well i've been in the national weather
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service almost 20 years now and let me
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tell you it has improved remarkably when
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i first got in the weather service we
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were getting images every 15 30 minutes
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you thought your internet is slow now
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it was nothing compared to waiting for
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satellite images
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now in an operational setting we're
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getting those same types of images and
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more every 30 to 60 seconds and so that
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really does make a difference when we're
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in severe weather winter weather
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operations and able to get those
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warnings out sooner i can believe it
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that is quite the improvement so we are
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also excited here for launch where will
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you be on launch day i will be at the
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banana creek viewing area and i'm very
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excited this is you know ghost t
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satellite has been i mean all the ghost
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highlights have been life-changing as
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far as meteorologists and forecasters
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and so the first two in this series the
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go satellites i was at home watching
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them and i'm so excited to be here on
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site to see my first rocket launch well
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we're very excited too thank you so much
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for tuning in go goes-t