NASA not only launched satellites to look into space – but also launched crafts to look back to earth. Along with the administration of the National Atmosphere (NOAA), NASA launched a new satellite for the observation of the earth called Goes-18 on March 1, 2022. Armed with an instrument called Imager Baseline Advanced (ABI), which was designed to imagine the weather of the earth, the ocean, and the environment ( Through Goes-R), NOAA shared the first beautiful satellite image in Earth earlier this year.
But Goes-18 doesn’t just see the earth. To understand the aspects of the earth’s weather complex, we also need to collect data about the sun. Goes-18 has been watching the sun since June 24, 2022, and NOAA recently released the first picture that has been taken from our star.
Worth heading to the NOAA website to see the sun’s video in action. This video shows a dramatic event called coronal mass ejection, where the hot plasma loop runs out of the surface of the sun, following the solar magnetic field line. The outside atmosphere of the sun, called the sun corona, consists of this hot plasma and loop which is sometimes discharged out of the sun can be millions of degrees Celsius at temperature.
This coronal mass ejection can have an effect on the earth in the form of space weather, where radiation is sent from the sun to enlarge through the solar system to hit our planet, where it interacts with our atmosphere. The weather of this space can affect satellites and can even be dangerous for astronauts (through NASA).
Staring at the sun
To get the best view of the sun, Goes-18 looks beyond the wavelength of the visible light and into ultraviolet wavelengths and extreme X-ray with the camera. This is important because various elements emit light at this wavelength when they become very hot, so by looking at this wavelength, Goes-18 can observe solar activity and see which elements are active.The photo above shows six different images each in different colors to represent six different channels from extreme ultraviolet cameras.
The large coronal mass ejection shown in the video and the image occurred on July 10, 2022. You can see this most clearly in the 304 Å channel, which is shown in the lower right image with red. According to NOAA, the sun becomes more active as part of the 11 -year cycle so we have to see more coronal mass ejection and events such as Surya Surya in the future.
Researchers in NOAA are still doing work on Goes-18, making sure everything operates as expected through testing and checking the instruments. So this picture and video is only a preview of data that can be collected. NOAA said that satellite must start its operational role in early 2023 when it will be used to monitor weather and provide early warnings about solar activities that can affect electricity companies, telecommunications providers, and satellites.
