NOAA Space Weather Mission Underway

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR), a new satellite designed to monitor space weather, launched on Wednesday, Feb. 11, aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. A partnership between NOAA, NASA and the U.S. Air Force, DSCOVR will maintain the nation’s solar wind observations, which are critical to the accuracy and lead time of NOAA’s space weather alerts, forecasts, and warnings. The spacecraft was built at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and carries two NASA Earth science instruments to advance our understanding of our home planet.