First images released from NOAA-21 VIIRS instrument

Vibrant blue water within the Caribbean Sea and smog in Northern India seem within the first world picture produced with knowledge from NOAA-21’s VIIRS instrument.

The Seen Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument on NOAA-21 started accumulating Earth science knowledge on Dec. 5 because the satellite handed over the East Coast of the US. Knowledge for the worldwide picture was collected over a interval of 24 hours between Dec. 5 and 6. This got here three weeks after NASA launched the NOAA-21 satellite from Vandenberg Area Drive Base in California on Nov. 10, 2022.

The VIIRS instrument—which additionally flies on the NOAA-20 and the NASA/NOAA Suomi-NPP satellites—supplies world measurements of the environment, land, and oceans. It was constructed by Raytheon Intelligence & Area in El Segundo, California.

“VIIRS serves so many disciplines, it is a fully vital set of measurements,” stated Dr. James Gleason, NASA undertaking scientist for the JPSS Flight Challenge. “VIIRS supplies many various knowledge merchandise which are utilized by scientists in unrelated fields, from agricultural economists making an attempt to do crop forecasts, to air high quality scientists forecasting the place wildfire smoke will likely be, to catastrophe help groups who depend evening lights to grasp the influence of a catastrophe.”

Over the oceans, VIIRS measures sea floor temperature, a metric that is vital for monitoring hurricane formation. It additionally measures ocean color, which helps scientists monitor phytoplankton exercise, a key indicator of ocean ecology and marine well being.

“The turquoise shade that is seen round Cuba and the Bahamas within the bottom-left picture above comes from sediment within the shallow waters across the continental shelf,” stated NOAA’s Dr. Satya Kalluri, Joint Polar Satellite tv for pc System program scientist.

Over land, VIIRS can detect and measure wildfires, droughts and floods, and its knowledge can be utilized to trace the thickness and motion of wildfire smoke. The underside-right picture above reveals haze and smog over Northern India that’s possible on account of agricultural burning. The snow-capped Himalayas and the Tibetan plateau are additionally seen to the north.

One of many distinctive options of VIIRS is its Day-Evening Band, which captures photographs of lights at evening, together with metropolis lights, lightning, auroras and lights from ships and fires. And one in all its most vital makes use of is imagery over Alaska, Dr. Kalluri stated. It’s because these satellites, which orbit the Earth from the North pole to the South pole, fly instantly over the Arctic a number of occasions a day.

The instrument additionally generates vital environmental merchandise on snow and ice cowl, clouds, fog, aerosols and dust, and the well being of the world’s crops.

This “first gentle” picture comes two weeks after the primary picture from the satellite’s Superior Know-how Microwave Sounder (ATMS) was launched. The satellite, often called JPSS-2 throughout the construct and launch, was formally renamed NOAA-21 after launch, following NOAA’s naming conventions for polar orbiting satellites.

“We had two VIIRS on orbit, and now we have three,” Dr. Gleason stated. “We launch a number of climate satellites to make doubly and now triply positive we at all times have one going. Area is a harmful surroundings. Stuff occurs and you’ll lose an instrument or a satellite, however we can not lose the info. It is too vital, to too many individuals.”