Satellite Imagery

Satellite images and the data they provide are likely the biggest-single advance in weather forecasting. Let’s take a closer look at weather satellites.

Tim Vasquez

Friday, December 27, 2024 at 08:00 AM ET

Verified

This close-up look at the modern GOES satellite shows the key equipment packages that are on board. (NASA/NOAA)

Key Takeaways:

Pilots utilize both geostationary (e.g., GOES) and low Earth orbit satellites for weather data, with modern GOES systems providing high-resolution, multi-channel imagery for enhanced situational awareness.
Visible satellite imagery offers intuitive, high-resolution views crucial for daylight assessment of low-level features like fog and stratus, while infrared imagery is used at night to detect temperature differences.
Multispectral products, such as Night Microphysics, are particularly valuable for pilots flying at night as they effectively highlight low-level clouds and fog that conventional infrared imagery might miss.
For the most accurate and detailed satellite information, pilots should access high-quality web-based sources that provide full resolution and various channels, generally avoiding reprocessed data found on many mobile apps.

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Sliding into the winter months, VMC gets a little bit more difficult to find. All pilots end up digging into their toolbox of weather resources to avoid the clouds and precipitation. METAR and TAF reports help out a lot, but one of the longtime favorites for this problem is weather satellite data. Of course to make the most out of this tool we need to understand a little more about the satellites we have available and how they collect the data.

How It Works

As you might guess, we can get a weather satellite by simply launching a camera into space. In fact, the very first satellite image of clouds came from a captured V-2 rocket launched in 1946 at White Sands, New Mexico. But designing a useful weather satellite system that can be used as part of a forecast system involves much more than simply launching a camera.