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NOAA National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS)

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NESDIS Reflects on 2018
Although we've already started another trip around the sun, we’d like to take a moment to look back on 2018. Last year, the NOAA Satellite and Information Service (NESDIS) came together to work through challenges with our newest geostationary satellite, GOES-17, provided data on a series of natural disasters, and improved the nation’s access to secure and timely global environmental data.
Five Things You Didn't Know About the North Pole
Around this time of year, we hear a lot about Santa and his elves working hard at the North Pole to make sure all the toys are ready for Christmas. However, we don’t always hear a lot about the place where all the magic happens. Here are just a few fun, scientific facts you should know about the North Pole: 
12 Datasets of Christmas
The 12 Datasets of Christmas
On the first day of Christmas the scientists gave to me...the World Magnetic Model? OK, fair warning, this isn’t your typical “12 Days of Christmas” song. We’ve compiled this list of NOAA's most interesting datasets so you can nerd out before the holidays. 
Metop-C launched on a Soyuz rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana on Nov. 7, carrying four POES-legacy instruments. Image by ESA-CNES-Arianespace/Optique du CSG - JM. Guillon
Metop-C Launch Closes Final Chapter On Historic POES Program
The Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite (POES) project can claim a number of firsts in its 40-year history. It was the nation’s first to provide global search and rescue capabilities from space. Its NOAA-10 and NOAA-11 satellites captured the first cloudless photograph of the entire planet Earth, pieced together using thousands of images. And its advanced data collection system, which pulled environmental data from buoys, balloons, tagged sea animals and streams, inspired a major citizen science effort on the ground and in classrooms around the country. 
Clouds or Snow? Here Are a Few Ways to Tell the Difference
At first glance, satellite imagery of the Earth can make it look like a giant blue and green marble with swirls of white. For many of us, that makes it hard to imagine how researchers and forecasters are able to determine whether those swirls of white are clouds or snow. However, being able to pinpoint snow cover is important because it can be used for search and rescue missions, water supply resource monitoring and management, as well as short-term forecasting. 
NOAA Targets January 2019 to Declare GOES-17 Operational
A recent software error on the GOES-17 Advanced Baseline Imager will delay the satellite from becoming operational until early 2019.
With Shrinking Arctic Sea Ice Comes Heightened National Security Concerns
While Arctic sea ice continues to shrink, human activity in the region is only growing. Ice extent, which is monitored by the U.S. National Ice Center (USNIC), often determines what types of activities are pursued in the region. Shrinking ice cover is making the Arctic more accessible to various countries, commercial entities and researchers, among others.
NOAA GOES-17 satellite view of the Hawaiian Islands on Nov. 13, 2018
NOAA GOES-17 Shares First Images of Alaska, Hawaii and the Pacific
The GOES-17 Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) has sent its first images from the satellite's new vantage point over the Pacific Ocean.
Snow squalls pose serious threats to personal safety and property, and produce costly transportation disruptions due to multi-vehicle pileups. Remember: There is no safe place on a highway when snow squalls are approaching. (NOAA)
Here’s How Satellite Data Helps Forecasters Issue Snow Squall Alerts
If you have a smartphone, you’ve likely received a severe weather alert warning of an impending flash flooding event, a tornado or a dangerous thunderstorm, and that’s in part thanks to information provided by the National Weather Service (NWS). Up until this year, however, the NWS didn’t have an alert system in place for a form of severe winter weather that is known to cause multi-car pile ups: snow squalls.