History of the NOAA satellite program

For more than 46 years, NOAA's environmental satellites have been an integral key to life-saving weather and climate forecasts for the United States. NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has a rich history of successfully operating geostationary operational environmental satellites (GOES) and polar-orbiting environmental satellites (POES) that have helped take some of the mystery out of atmospheric phenomenon. Through the years, NOAA, with cooperation with NASA, has developed increasingly advanced satellites that have provided higher spatial and temporal resolution images, operational soundings, atmospheric temperature and moisture data in all weather situations. During those 46 years, NOAA has also built strong partnerships within the U. S. and throughout the world, leading to satellite-data sharing agreements that will strengthen the scientific community's understanding of the world's changing climate. The article, History of the NOAA Satellite Program, traces the development of the U. S. weather satellite system from an early commitment in 1953 by the Eisenhower administration to hoist an Earth satellite in orbit in 1958, to the next generation polar-orbiting system, the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System, or NPOESS.