Topic: GOES-13/14/15/16/17 Fall 2021 Solar RFI predicted times are now available

Date/Time Issued: September 28, 2021 1815 UTC

Product(s) or Data Impacted: GOES-14/15/16/17 Imager and Sounder Data plus Ancillary Services (GVAR, SAR, HRIT, GRB, RDL, etc.)

Date/Time of Initial Impact: October 4, 2021 2119 UTC

Date/Time of Expected End: October 18, 2021 2101 UTC

Length of Outage: See table in details.

Details/Specifics of Change: The potential for solar radio frequency interference (RFI) with a satellite downlink circuit will occur whenever the Sun passes into the beam of the ground station receiving antenna.

We received the following information from our Mission Operations Division concerning the potential for outages of the GOES data stream including GVAR (GOES Variable) Imager and Sounder, SAR (Search and Rescue), High Rate Information Transmission (HRIT), Sensor Data (SD), Telemetry and Command (T&C), Weather Facsimile (WEFAX), Data Collection Platform Report (DCPR), Multi-use data link (MDL), Raw Data Link (RDL), etc.

The Wallops and Fairbanks Command and Data Acquisition Stations (CDAs) and Environmental Satellite Processing Center (ESPC) receiving antennas may experience periods of Solar RFI as predicted below. Solar RFI can cause loss of telemetry lock and command capability, as well as degradation or loss in the GVAR data.

Solar RFI predicted times for the Fall 2021:

SOLAR RFI PREDICTED TIMES FOR FALL 2021

SPACECRAFT                DATE                   TIME          STATION      OPERATIONAL IMPACT

GOES-14             5 OCT – 12 OCT       1855 - 1906Z    WALLOPS     T&C

       5 OCT – 12 OCT       1854 - 1905Z     SUITLAND

       5 OCT – 12 OCT       1852 - 1903Z     FAIRMONT

GOES-15             4 OCT – 11 OCT        2034 - 2046Z    WALLOPS     GVAR, PDR, T&C, SD, MDL

       5 OCT – 12 OCT        2033 - 2045Z    SUITLAND   

       5 OCT – 12 OCT        2032 - 2044Z    FAIRMONT    

     11 OCT – 18 OCT        2003 - 2015Z    FAIRBANK

GOES-16             4 OCT – 11 OCT        1644 - 1655Z    WALLOPS     RDL, GRB, T&C, HRIT, DCPC,

       4 OCT – 11 OCT        1643 - 1654Z    SUITLAND    SAR

       4 OCT – 11 OCT        1641 - 1653Z    FAIRMONT       

GOES-17             3 OCT – 10 OCT       2118 - 2129Z    WALLOPS     RDL, GRB, T&C, HRIT, DCPC,

       3 OCT – 10 OCT       2117 - 2128Z    SUITLAND    SAR

       4 OCT – 11 OCT       2117 - 2128Z    FAIRMONT       

Contact Information for Further Information: ESPC Operations atESPCOperations@noaa.gov at 301-817-3880

Web Site(s) for applicable information:

See http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/SATS/messages.html for this and other satellite related messages.

See http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/Operations/GOES/schedules.html for full GOES scanning schedules and scan sectors.

See http://www.osd.noaa.gov/GVAR_Downloads/gvar_downloads.html for more GVAR information.

See http://www.noaasis.noaa.gov/ for Direct Services Branch (DSB) information.

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