. 24/7 Space News .
TECH SPACE
Suomi-NPP Satellite Instrument Restored After Radiation Damage
by Jenny Marder for GSFC News
Greenbelt MD (SPX) Sep 10, 2019

illustration only

A team of engineers, scientists, and satellite operators recently restored a damaged satellite instrument that is used to measure temperature and water vapor in the Earth's atmosphere.

After the instrument, the Cross-track Infrared Sounder (CrIS), was damaged by radiation as it flew on the Suomi-NPP satellite, the team made a successful switch to the sensor's electronic B-side, returning the instrument to full capability.

Meanwhile, to fill the data gap created by the event, scientists from the Joint Polar Satellite System fast-tracked similar data from Suomi-NPP's cousin, the NOAA-20 satellite, to the National Weather Service (NWS).

The CrIS instrument probes the sky vertically for details on temperature and water vapor - using a process is known as sounding. These observations provide important information on our planet's atmospheric chemistry and composition, which inform weather forecast centers, environmental data records and field campaign experiments. CrIS can also quantify the distributions of trace gases in the atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide and methane.

CrIS sees in three spectral bands within the infrared part of the spectrum: shortwave, midwave and longwave. Analysts first detected the anomaly in the midwave data on Saturday, March 23. By Monday, things weren't looking good, said Flavio Iturbide-Sanchez, the CrIS instrument's calibration validation lead.

The midwave band, which includes channels sensitive to water vapor, had stopped reading properly. The next day, measurements from that band had disappeared completely.

"Midwave is particularly focused on moisture," said Clayton Buttles, the CrIS chief engineer for L3Harris Technologies, the instrument's contractor. "Losing that creates a hole in the data products used to generate weather forecast predictions. Ideally, you want to combine all three bands into a comprehensive unit that allows for better forecast and prediction."

An algorithm called the NOAA Unique Combined Atmospheric Processing System, or NUCAPS, provides the only satellite soundings available to National Weather Service's weather forecast offices, said Bill Sjoberg, a senior systems engineer with NOAA and JPSS. NUCAPS combines infrared and microwave observations to produce atmospheric profiles of temperature and water vapor, and it relies on CrIS data. Without the CrIS soundings, forecasters would have risked losing the ability to derive an important set of measurements during afternoon hours when severe convection is most common.

But NOAA-20, which flies 50 minutes ahead, has its own identical CrIS instrument.

Accelerating access to NOAA-20 satellite soundings for the National Weather Service "helped reestablish the ability to track changes in severe weather conditions," Sjoberg said.

Meanwhile, after months of analyzing what went wrong in March, the team determined that the problem with the instrument was likely caused by radiation damage to its midwave infrared signal processor, said David Johnson, NASA's CrIS instrument scientist. Raw data from the detectors goes through the signal processor, where the data rate gets greatly reduced in size so that it can be efficiently delivered to the ground stations.

Fortunately, like all of the JPSS instruments and much of the spacecraft, CrIS has redundant parts. It was designed with this threat in mind. It contains a "Side 2," a fully functional backup set of electronics, which the team hoped had not been damaged.

"But we wouldn't know without making the switch," Iturbide-Sanchez said.

For three months, the team studied the instrument. They ran a "reliability analysis." They weighed the risks. They "located and verified all configuration files for Side 2," Johnson said.

On June 21, the team made the official decision to switch to Side 2, and three days later, they executed the switch. The turn-on process involved tuning the instrument and checking settings. But Iturbide-Sanchez knew almost immediately that the three bands were working.

The plan was to complete the turn-on in two weeks. They did it in five days, a result of working long hours and frequent communication with ground station command. And by early July, satellite soundings had been recovered and the product was good enough to be used in weather models.

It was very much a team effort, Iturbide-Sanchez and Johnson both said: The Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies at the University of Wisconsin and the Joint Center for Earth System's Technology at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, worked with the team during both phases, contributing to the preparation of a configuration file before the side switch, and evaluating data quality after.

"NOAA invests in redundant systems to maximize the useful life of the instruments," said Jim Gleason, NASA project scientist for JPSS. "This is a story of the system working as designed."

Making the successful switch from Side 1 to Side 2 also allows for National Weather Service products that provide early warnings for events like hurricanes, Buttles said:

"We would all be worse off if we didn't have that data."


Related Links
Suomi-NPP Mission at NASA
Space Technology News - Applications and Research


Thanks for being there;
We need your help. The SpaceDaily news network continues to grow but revenues have never been harder to maintain.

With the rise of Ad Blockers, and Facebook - our traditional revenue sources via quality network advertising continues to decline. And unlike so many other news sites, we don't have a paywall - with those annoying usernames and passwords.

Our news coverage takes time and effort to publish 365 days a year.

If you find our news sites informative and useful then please consider becoming a regular supporter or for now make a one off contribution.
SpaceDaily Monthly Supporter
$5+ Billed Monthly


paypal only
SpaceDaily Contributor
$5 Billed Once


credit card or paypal


TECH SPACE
Shaken but not stirred: Konnect satellite completes vibration tests
Canne, France(ESA) Sep 09, 2019
The first Spacebus Neo satellite - Konnect, a high-throughput satellite ordered by Eutelsat - has successfully completed its mechanical test campaign in Thales Alenia Space facilities in Cannes. The test demonstrates the ability of the satellite to withstand the strong shaking that occurs during launch. The project partners - ESA, Thales Alenia Space, CNES and Eutelsat - were very pleased by the performance achieved. "Despite exposure to the most extreme mechanical loads, the first Spacebus ... read more

Comment using your Disqus, Facebook, Google or Twitter login.



Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle

TECH SPACE
UAE Wants to Train More Astronauts for Arab World - Emirati Official

Taking the next giant leaps

Malaysia Interested in Having Access to Russian Space Tech, Prime Minister Says

Voice-command ovens, robots for pets on show at Berlin's IFA tech fair

TECH SPACE
Putin reveals he offered to sell Trump Russia's hypersonic missiles

Russia Launches Rokot Space Rocket to Orbit Military Satellite

Russian Space Agency to Test Modernized Fregat Upper Stage During Launch of Meteor Satellite in 2020

Trump says US 'not involved' in Iranian rocket failure

TECH SPACE
'Martian CSI' Sheds Light on How Asteroid Impacts Generated Running Water Under Red Planet

NASA Research Gives New Insight into How Much Atmosphere Mars Lost

NASA engineers attach Mars Helicopter to Mars 2020 rover

ESA Chief says discussed ExoMars 2020 launch with Roscosmos

TECH SPACE
China's KZ-1A rocket launches two satellites

China's newly launched communication satellite suffers abnormality

China launches first private rocket capable of carrying satellites

Chinese scientists say goodbye to Tiangong-2

TECH SPACE
Private Chinese firms tapping international space market

Iridium and Thales Expand Partnership to Deliver Aircraft Connectivity Services

ESA re-routes satellite to avoid SpaceX collision risk

Cutting-edge Chinese satellite malfunctions after launch

TECH SPACE
Shaken but not stirred: Konnect satellite completes vibration tests

Seeking moments of disorder

Defrosting surfaces in seconds

China's Tianhe-2 Supercomputer to Crunch Space Data From New Radio Telescope

TECH SPACE
Planetary collisions can drop the internal pressures in planets

How to Spin a Disk Around Young Protostars

Potassium Detected in an Exoplanet Atmosphere

Deep-sea sediments reveal solar system chaos: An advance in dating geologic archives

TECH SPACE
Storms on Jupiter are disturbing the planet's colorful belts

ALMA shows what's inside Jupiter's storms

Young Jupiter was smacked head-on by massive newborn planet

Mission to Jupiter's icy moon confirmed









The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2024 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. All articles labeled "by Staff Writers" include reports supplied to Space Media Network by industry news wires, PR agencies, corporate press officers and the like. Such articles are individually curated and edited by Space Media Network staff on the basis of the report's information value to our industry and professional readership. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Statement Our advertisers use various cookies and the like to deliver the best ad banner available at one time. All network advertising suppliers have GDPR policies (Legitimate Interest) that conform with EU regulations for data collection. By using our websites you consent to cookie based advertising. If you do not agree with this then you must stop using the websites from May 25, 2018. Privacy Statement. Additional information can be found here at About Us.