QuikSCAT satellite nearing failure

[littlevince]

Don't know if anyone posted this yet, if so, mods please delete

QuikSCAT satellite nearing failure; Congress poised to slash NOAA funding

The QuikSCAT satellite, launched in 1999, provides crucial measurements of surface wind speed and direction over Earth's oceans twice per day. Forecasters world-wide have come to rely on data from QuikSCAT to issue timely warnings and make accurate forecasts of tropical and extratropical storms, wave heights, sea ice, aviation weather, iceberg movement, coral bleaching events, and El Niño. Just one example of QuikSCAT's value (H. Kite-Powell, 2008) is that wind data from QuikSCAT and the resulting improvements to warning and forecast services save the container and bulk shipping industry $135 million annually by reducing their exposure to hurricane force wind conditions in non-tropical storms by 44% over the North Pacific and North Atlantic. Originally expected to last just 2 - 3 years, QuikSCAT is now ten years old, and will be lucky to survive into 2010. NASA and NOAA notified Congress in September that there is a significant chance QuikSCAT will fail in the next few months. According to scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, "the mechanism that maintains the constant 18 rpm rotation rate of the antenna that scans Earth's surface has grown steadily worse over the past six months. Engineering telemetry shows that the torque loss due to friction in the bearing system has been increasing at an alarming rate in recent weeks and that if the trend continues, the rotation speed will begin to slow significantly within the next few weeks or months. When that happens, scatterometer calibration and spatial sampling will be affected. Eventually the wind vector data products from QuikSCAT will no longer be reliable for operational forecasting. The timing is not predictable, but forecasters should anticipate loss of the QuikSCAT near-real-time data in the near future."

As I argued in a post earlier this year, "The case for a new QuikSCAT satellite", replacing QuikSCAT should be a high priority for Congress. The earliest a replacement satellite could be launched is 2015--if immediate action is taken to procure funding. Losing QuikSCAT is going to make it much more difficult to assess the strength and position of tropical storms over the open Atlantic, where the Hurricane Hunters cannot reach.

Senate vote Tuesday may significantly cut NOAA funding
I urge all of you who value the services provided by the National Weather Service and their parent organization, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), to contact your two Senators and ask them to vote against the Senator Hutchison (R-TX) Amendment #2666 to the Commerce State Justice Appropriations Act for 2010 H.R. 2847. This amendment will be voted on this Tuesday, October 13, by the Senate, and would cut the NOAA budget by $172 million. The funds would be diverted to the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, to increase its budget by 75%. While I'm sure the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program is a worthy program to support, Congress should find a different way to fund this program. NOAA's total budget is about $4 billion, and the National Weather Service Budget is a little less than $1 billion. The only place where NOAA has the flexibility to absorb the proposed cuts would be in the satellite program. With the QuickSCAT satellite likely to fail in the next few months, and the Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission (TRMM) satellite also nearing its demise, the last thing we should be doing is cutting NOAA's budget in time when our capability to observe the weather from space is suffering from serious degradation.

Here's the language of the bill, and the proposed amendments:

SA 2666. Mrs. HUTCHISON (for herself, Mr. CORNYN, Mr. KYL, and Mr. MCCAIN) submitted an amendment intended to be proposed by her to the bill H.R. 2847, making appropriations for the Departments of Commerce and Justice, and Science, and Related Agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2010, and for other purposes; which was ordered to lie on the table; as follows:

On page 170, between lines 19 and 20, insert the following:

SEC. 220. INCREASE IN STATE CRIMINAL ALIEN ASSISTANCE PROGRAM FUNDING.

(a) In General.--For an additional amount under the heading ``STATE AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT ASSISTANCE'' under the heading ``Office of Justice Programs'' under this title, there is appropriated, for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2010, $172,000,000 for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, as authorized by section 241(i)(5) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1231(i)(5)).

(b) Offset.--The total amount appropriated under the heading ``OPERATIONS, RESEARCH, AND FACILITIES'' under the heading ``National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration'' under title I is reduced by $172,000,000.

The National Weather Service Employees Organization has put out a press release with more details.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=1347

[Frank2]

Thanks for alerting us - this bill seems to have more potential than anything of the Sen. Santorum era...

Frank

[Sanibel]

Dave.

Yes Hal.

I detect that the Quick Scat satellite will fail within a year...

[brunota2003]

It's gonna suck when QuikSCAT dies. I use it all the time, and the data is invaluable IMO.

[wxman57]

QuikSCAT's death may not be so bad. It may be the only thing that'll spark some action to replace it. A possible replacement, XOVWM, could provide more detailed wind data (through rain) with a return interval of 1-2 hours vs. at most twice a day with QS.

[somethingfunny]

Just one example of QuikSCAT's value (H. Kite-Powell, 2008) is that wind data from QuikSCAT and the resulting improvements to warning and forecast services save the container and bulk shipping industry $135 million annually by reducing their exposure to hurricane force wind conditions in non-tropical storms by 44% over the North Pacific and North Atlantic.

Judging from this, if Congress refuses to fund a replacement satellite, a private company will likely build it instead to tap into that sort of demand. Shipping companies and private forecasting firms would undoubtedly pay enough money for this information to finance the launch of the replacement and then some. Simply not having QuikSCAT isn't an option anymore because the information is very valuable. It's the beginning of a slippery slope placing tollbooths on the Information Superhighway and I hope we find a way to get a publicly-funded replacement launched.

[wxman57]

Here's a part of a presentation I made on "What's New in Hurricane Science" a few years ago, talking about the XOVWM satellite series. XOVWM stands for eXtended Ocean Vector surface Wind Mission. Some good comparisons of XOVWM vs. QS data for Rita.

Keep in mind that the presentation was from 2008, so the estimates on the earliest possible launch (2015) may be off now. So if QS fails now with no replacement in the works, it'll be 3-5 years before we get such data again. As for a private launch, and private weather companies paying for the satellite & data, I doubt there are enough such companies to lower the cost to something that a non-government agency could afford. I work for a pretty big weather company but we probably couldn't afford to pay for QS data. We can't even afford full ECMWF data.

http://myweb.cableone.net/nolasue/XOVWM.pdf

[ozonepete]

Hi Everybody,
I just saw this in Dr. Masters weather blog. It seems like it's worth a chance to try and save it. I signed the letter. Here's the excerpt:

Take action: sign the QuikSCAT letter
The QuikSCAT satellite, launched in 1999, provides crucial measurements of surface wind speed and direction over Earth's oceans twice per day. Forecasters world-wide have come to rely on data from QuikSCAT to issue timely warnings and make accurate forecasts of tropical and extratropical storms, wave heights, sea ice, aviation weather, iceberg movement, coral bleaching events, and El Niño. QuikSCAT's antenna is expected to fail within the next six months, according to engineers at NASA/JPL, and QuikSCAT data has already been removed from our global weather forecast models, due to concerns about data reliability.

There exists a narrow window of opportunity in the next few days to get the wheels in motion to launch a QuikSCAT replacement instrument on a Japanese satellite in 2015. The funding for this must start within the next budget cycle, and there is currently no funding in place for a replacement QuikSCAT. If we miss this this opportunity, it may be ten years or more before a QuikSCAT replacement can be launched. To this end, I urge all of you to sign the QuikSCAT funding letter being presented to John Holdren, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

The letter is at: http://coaps.fsu.edu/scatterometry/statement/.

If you agree with the letter, please sign it (via the web site) as soon as possible: there is a very small window of opportunity to influence the next budget cycle, with this window closing within a few days.

Note that to validate your signature you must type the validation code in the bottom box. This code is the word that appears after 'code =', then click on the sign button.

For more information on QuikSCAT, see my post, The case for a new QuikSCAT satellite.

[JonathanBelles]

Signed. I really hope we dont see QS fail, and furthermore I hope it gets replaced in the next 10 years.

[expat2carib]

Signed..... even that I think it needs refinement. It looks like a technical tool from the "stone age".

Things are going fast................

[brunota2003]

Yikes...within the next six months? I cannot fathom looking at sat images and not being able to compare them to some type of QuikSCAT data for a few weeks, let alone many years!

[wxman57]

Perhaps it would be best if it failed immediately. Nothing's going to get done until it's gone. With all of its issues (resolution, can't see through rain, revisit period 12-24 hours or more, etc), it's really of limited value most of the time. The new instruments would be a tremendous improvement.

[srainhoutx]

Perhaps it would be best if it failed immediately. Nothing's going to get done until it's gone.

I tend to agree. We seem to not "fix" things until something happens to warrant a newer solution. I just hope that we do not have to wait until 2015-2020 to launch a new platform, though.

[HurricaneRobert]

Just one example of QuikSCAT's value (H. Kite-Powell, 2008) is that wind data from QuikSCAT and the resulting improvements to warning and forecast services save the container and bulk shipping industry $135 million annually by reducing their exposure to hurricane force wind conditions in non-tropical storms by 44% over the North Pacific and North Atlantic.

Judging from this, if Congress refuses to fund a replacement satellite, a private company will likely build it instead to tap into that sort of demand. Shipping companies and private forecasting firms would undoubtedly pay enough money for this information to finance the launch of the replacement and then some. Simply not having QuikSCAT isn't an option anymore because the information is very valuable. It's the beginning of a slippery slope placing tollbooths on the Information Superhighway and I hope we find a way to get a publicly-funded replacement launched.

QuickSCAT cost about $500 million, and was meant to last about 2-3 years. It might be worth it to shipping industry if they could bring it lower than $338, but the cost is too high.

[Cyclenall]

Yikes...within the next six months? I cannot fathom looking at sat images and not being able to compare them to some type of QuikSCAT data for a few weeks, let alone many years!

Turns out, within the next six days not months .

[SouthFLTropics]

As Bones would say..."It's Dead Jim"

Statement from NASA...

Several hours ago, shortly past 7:00Z today (23Nov), telemetry received from QuikSCAT indicates that the antenna rotation rate has dropped to zero and remains at zero. The motor remains powered. The system can be operated safely in this state for an indefinite period. The QuikSCAT operations team will be meeting later this morning, but in all likelihood this is the end of the nominal mission".

End of an era...

SFT

[wxman57]

Yep, it's dead. It lasted many years beyond its projected lifetime. I think it's a good thing. This should spur a movement to replace it. Newer instruments (XOVWM) will not have all the problems of QS - low res, can't see through rain, can't measure speeds over a certain level, and, most importantly, the new instruments could have a revisit period for a certain patch of ocean (with 2-3 satellites in orbit) of 1-3 hours vs. 12-24 hours (or more) for QS. Bad news is no XOVWM launch is scheduled through 2014.

Some slides from my talk back in 2008 on XOVWM:






And, finally, Bones regrets to say...

[wxman57]

Bump..

Main thread on QS. See info on a possible replacement, XOVWM, in my post, above.