Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

spaceweather.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 99 posts

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#81

Post by mthoms »

zanecodes wrote: post #56
mthoms wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be great if an LLM could be trained to generate interpolated images between the 10m intervals of the full disk geocolor product. The animations would be fantastic. I've got about 2.5 years worth of that imagery if someone knows a good way to do this on a budget.

I doubt you need an LLM for that, a diffusion model or perhaps even a deep CNN could probably do a passable job. You could train it by taking consecutive triplets of images [A, B, C] and providing [A, C] as inputs with B as the expected output.

Thanks, that was poorly worded.

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#82

Post by walrus01 »

GTP wrote: post #75
dabluecaboose wrote: post #15

Former GOES engineer here. At this point I'd almost be surprised if 19 didn't have something go wrong. We had issues on almost every other satellite. GOES-17 had the loop heat pipe anomaly(Supposedly from someone stepping on it in the cleanroom...), GOES-15 (IIRC) had a micrometeorite strike, and GOES-13 had a fuel tank anomaly right before deorbit. GOES-16 and GOES-17 are on-orbit spares, so in the extremely unlikel…

You expect cleanrooms to be extremely controlled environments where skilled technicians and engineers very carefully handle sensitive equipment... Then someone steps on a component :D

NOAA-19 was dropped on its side because somebody forgot to attach the bolts to the transport platform it was riding on.

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=satellite...

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#83

Post by kittikitti »

These environmental satellites affect our day-to-day including the accuracy of weather forecasts. I believe the GOES program must receive more government funding because GOES-19 is a single point of failure and there have been numerous funding concerns. This is a national security issue because lack of resources to mitigate emergency weather events can lead to increased loss of life.

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#84

Post by KennyBlanken »

pooloo wrote: post #45
fishgoesblub wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Supposedly from someone stepping on it in the cleanroom I would be too embarrassed to return to work if I did that.

How do they track that? Is there a log book where someone has to write to? "Observed EMP555 step on loop heat pipe. Conducted visual inspection of the affected area; no damage found, pipe remains nominal."

Since it went into space with the stepped-on part, clearly nobody DID write it up.

They really don't care. If the satellite blows up or fails, they get to build another.

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#85

Post by KennyBlanken »

krisoft wrote: post #79
GTP wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You expect cleanrooms to be extremely controlled environments where skilled technicians and engineers very carefully handle sensitive equipment... Then someone steps on a component :D

Yeah. Stuff happens. There is the famous case of dropping the NOAA N-Prime weather satellite on the ground. They were trying to turn it from vertical to horizontal and they forgot to bolt it to the adapter. Worse: multiple people signed the paperwork attesting that they verified that it was bolted down correctly. Pictures and details here: https://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0410/04noaanreport/ Or the famous “space alig…

> Stuff happens.

> There is the famous case of dropping the NOAA N-Prime weather satellite on the ground. They were trying to turn it from vertical to horizontal and they forgot to bolt it to the adapter. Worse: multiple people signed the paperwork attesting that they verified that it was bolted down correctly.

That wasn't a case of "stuff happens." It was a case of systemic issues with defense contractor employees not doing the work they were supposed to be, cutting corners, and "not giving a shit because if it breaks the government will just order another one from us."

It was basically fraud/grift/incompetence, not "stuff happens."

> If I remember it right because the man who usually assembled that part had to leave during assembly because his wife was giving birth. Someone put it together but appearantely not correctly.

And why was the process so poorly documented only one guy could do it right?

Why didn't someone check the assembly?

Answer: defense contractor laziness and incompetence.

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#86

Post by Alive-in-2025 »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #84
pooloo wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do they track that? Is there a log book where someone has to write to? "Observed EMP555 step on loop heat pipe. Conducted visual inspection of the affected area; no damage found, pipe remains nominal."

Since it went into space with the stepped-on part, clearly nobody DID write it up. They really don't care. If the satellite blows up or fails, they get to build another.

I didn't but that's the case. More likely there was a limited chance to evaluate the issue and something like they had a limited time launch window, no replacement ready and it tested good. "Just put a little butter on it, it's fine".

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#87

Post by bagels »

krisoft wrote: post #79
GTP wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You expect cleanrooms to be extremely controlled environments where skilled technicians and engineers very carefully handle sensitive equipment... Then someone steps on a component :D

Yeah. Stuff happens. There is the famous case of dropping the NOAA N-Prime weather satellite on the ground. They were trying to turn it from vertical to horizontal and they forgot to bolt it to the adapter. Worse: multiple people signed the paperwork attesting that they verified that it was bolted down correctly. Pictures and details here: https://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0410/04noaanreport/ Or the famous “space alig…

Upside IMU is my favorite if only for the stupidity and spectacular video that resulted.

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#88

Post by waste_monk »

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #78
bigfatkitten wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I learned recently that it can also mean "the spacecraft exploded on the launchpad in an enormous fireball." https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-05-29/blue-origin-rocket-ex...

That's already known as "rapid unscheduled disassembly" - and happens so-often in spaceflight that it's hardly anomalous at this point.

I do love the term "lithobraking" as well.

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#89

Post by superxpro12 »

dabluecaboose wrote: post #73
Rygian wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From now on, every time I see the word "anomaly" I will assume it is an euphemism for "someone stepped on it".

"Anomaly" is one of those words that, in the space industry, can mean anything from "Our payload isn't behaving as well as we're expecting" to "Someone stepped on it" to "A rock hit it" You can use it to describe literally anything that's off nominal. It's fantastic.

I feel like we're all forgetting the most obvious root cause... "aliens"

Re: Goes-19 weather satellite enters Safe Hold mode

#90

Post by superxpro12 »

fhdkweig wrote: post #80
krisoft wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. Stuff happens. There is the famous case of dropping the NOAA N-Prime weather satellite on the ground. They were trying to turn it from vertical to horizontal and they forgot to bolt it to the adapter. Worse: multiple people signed the paperwork attesting that they verified that it was bolted down correctly. Pictures and details here: https://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0410/04noaanreport/ Or the famous “space alig…

> multiple people signed the paperwork attesting that they verified that it was bolted down correctly. In my experience, the more people who are assigned to do something, the more those people assume that someone else did it and slack off. Of course, I've never worked on something as difficult to fix as an orbital satellite.

The infamous "it fell in-between the seat and the console" problem.

These happen constantly. It's always important to close the loop on these and make sure someone is assigned to it directly, not left to indirectly assume.

Post reply on HN