“Researchers say the satellites themselves are operating normally and do not appear to have suffered any errors that would physically prevent the data from continuing to be collected and distributed, so the abrupt data halt might have been an intentional decision.”
Wait, the U.S. aren’t even going to try selling the satellites? We’re just scrapping them?
The intent is to disable the capability to ignore the data. If you allow access to someone else, you're not preventing the data capture and dissemination. If the data shows hurricanes are intensifying in strength due to climate change, and you no longer capture the data, you can say with a straight face "No it isn't and you can't prove it."
How large systems with exposure to these places (insurance, capital markets) respond is what you should look to next. What do you do when you don't have the data to accurately price risk?
To what end? What is the benefit of shutting down and ignoring data when for the last decade and a half even with data didn’t matter? I didn’t matter before why would it now?
> 2016 failure of DMSP 19 without replacement[edit]
On 11 February 2016, a power failure left both the command-and-control subsystem and its backup without the ability to reach the satellite's processor, according to the U.S. Air Force Space Command investigation released in July 2016 that also announced that DMSP 5D-3/F19 was considered to be 'lost'. The satellite's data can still be used, until it ceases pointing the sensors towards the Earth. The satellite was the most recent on-orbit, having been launched on 3 April 2014.[15]
> The failure only left F16, F17 and F18 – all significantly past their expected 3–5 year lifespan – operational. F19's planned replacement was not carried out because Congress ordered the destruction of the already constructed F20 probe to save money by not having to pay its storage costs. It is unlikely that a new DMSP satellite would be launched before 2023; by then the three remaining satellites should no longer be operational.[16]
To anyone acting as if this is a surprise or they're suddenly caught out and have to switch to another provider, I have to wonder, with the writing on the wall for 8 years now, how have you not already updated your plans?
That's the guardian for you. Remove context. Generate hyperbole. Beg for money.
There is one operating satellite in this constellation, and congress voted to shut down the program in 2015.
The DMSP program was discontinued in 2015 by a vote in congress[1]. Virtually every working stallelite in this program has failed. As best as I can tell there's just a single working one specifically NOAA-19[2].
Instead the program has switched to JPSS[3] which is part of GEOSS[4].
It feels like the title here isn't accurate - we haven't lost the satellite at all. It wasn't destroyed, it wasn't de-orbited (on purpose or accidentally), it wasn't hacked or hijacked.
Can we ask dang to change the title to something like "Blocking of key US satellite data could...."?
Well there's your problem. They were tracking the arctic! That means they were bad satellites that hurt people. They contradict the government's idea that climate science doesn't exist
I was about to say this -- the impact is to deep red states -- Florida, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama.
They all voted for this with extreme skew towards the current policies. What is the point of trying to save this satellite data if the very people most affected dont care for it?
Do you realize how little people in these areas pay attention to these forecasts? Hurricanes until you hit CAT 5 are viewed as bad rain storms that may or may not take the power out for a week. There is little evacuation or prep for the majority of people there as they are consistently prepared. Even still, the real threat of a hurricane isn’t the hurricane itself but the storm surge and all the tornadoes they create. Neither of those can be predicted with any accuracy so please help me understand why pathing is important?
This is such a bad article. They shut down this specific program in 2015, and switched to JPSS instead.
There is no war on anyone, and this has nothing to do with Trump, DOGS, or Climate change. Rather there were too many satellite failures, leaving just a single operating one in orbit.
Good grief. American KH-11 electro-optical spy satellites have 2.4 meter primary mirrors and orbit at ~300km or less. Ease yourself off the anti-Musk subreddits or wherever you're getting this incoherent nonsense.
“The ATMS sounder that remains is far inferior to hurricane forecasters than the SSMIS instrument the Department of Defense is discontinuing. Unlike the SSMIS which scans at a continuous resolution, the quality of the ATMS degrades considerably on its edges, rendering the sounder useless for most operational hurricane forecasts. The example below shows the difference between the scans from both instruments for Hurricane Erick last Wednesday, June 18th.”
The Trump administration is proposing to end all NOAA climate research (alongside nearly all other NOAA research).
The damage to weather prediction and climate research will go far beyond "decommissioning old sensors." We're talking about an abrupt end to nearly all science related to climate and weather in the US. Even if a future administration decides to turn funding back on, it will take a generation to rebuild the research community.
No encryption*. I think they broadcast on S-band which isn't necessarily compatible with a $20 hobbyist rtl-sdr, but still possible with more advanced amateur setups
* Ok that's an oversimplification. They actually turn encryption on while the satellite is over certain areas. But if you're in the Continental US I think it's in the clear
So IIRC for the last 50 years the DMSP satellites broadcast all their data in the clear. If the program is only shutting down the ground stations and data distribution, it seems like an opportunity for some researchers to buy some SDRs and start collecting their own data.
I'm actually surprised that the successors to DMSP don't meet the same needs. Or is the problem that they do and the government just doesn't share that data?
DMSP satellites broadcast on 2.2-2.3 GHz S-band with relatively simple modulation, making reception possible with a 1.5m dish and ~$300 in SDR equipment.
>The loss of DMSP comes as Noaa’s weather and climate monitoring services have become critically understaffed this year as Donald Trump’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) initiative has instilled draconian cuts to federal environmental programs.
Translation:
"We can't actually say this was DOGE, so we're going to imply it using emotionally charged words, and 90% of folks with bad media literacy will come away thinking it was DOGE (just check the reddit comments)."
This in-vogue method of "lying without lying" is shockingly common nowadays, but apparently it's okay for media to lie because Bad Man Bad.
The article is saying it was DOGE. DOGE directly attacked our hurricane-forecasting capacity [1]. OMB, i.e. Vought, continues that attack [2].
Given the top three states by hurricane risk voted for Trump in ‘24 [3][4] this should make for an entertaining hurricane season. (Particularly if both a red and blue state get hit and request federal assistance.)
We can all become Amish while Bezos, Trump, etc. fly around in their privately owned 747s. Perfect society for our capital and power ownership class… that is until the hounds are at the door threatening the security of their capital or the economy downturn makes it far enough their wealth and power won’t buy the level of opulence they expect on the daily. Difficult to fly around if no one’s producing runways and jet fuel, etc.
The problem of important projects surviving political change is a tough one.
A lot of these important projects have a single point of failure - who is the president every four years. I wonder how we build institutions and resources resilient to that?
I realize privatization is an ugly word, but could some of this stuff be provided by the private sector?
Can we make it possible to fund initiatives in a multinational manner where countries contribute to these efforts, but if one country blinks out, then you still have it go along?
If a president can ignore the laws requiring those projects to exist, the president can ignore the laws protecting private companies from being nationalized and shut down.
> A lot of these important projects have a single point of failure - who is the president every four years. I wonder how we build institutions and resources resilient to that?
We already did. The legislative branch allocates funds for stuff that the people deem worthy. That budget becomes law. The Constitution says the "President shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." There's even a specific law that prevents the President from withholding Congressionally-approved funds.
What you are seeing here is not a lack of designed resilience, it's the wilful removal of that system.
> who is the president every four years...could some of this stuff be provided by the private sector?
A president cares about election every four years. Private sector cares about it every quarter. I doubt privatization is improvement if you want to focus on long term.
> could some of this stuff be provided by the private sector?
Yes, but the key man problem still exists. For instance, SpaceX could build/operate a network of weather satellites for various nations but the instability of the founder leads to similar issues.
This is likely because the DMSP satellites are outdated:
"In 2015, Congress voted to terminate the DMSP program and to scrap the DMSP 5D-3/F20 satellite, ordering the Air Force to move on to a next-generation system." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Meteorological_Satelli...
Someone in the USA should litigate to forestall any irreversible shut down/sunsetting of these satellites. Under automatic systems they might last until the midterms when a 'night of the long knives' might reap a huge harvest - perhaps a dual supermajority to allow for some reforms?
Its almost as if a totalitarian government is trying to isolate its population from objective reality, and make them dependent of the state narrative for understanding of the world.
61 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 77.7 ms ] threadWait, the U.S. aren’t even going to try selling the satellites? We’re just scrapping them?
How large systems with exposure to these places (insurance, capital markets) respond is what you should look to next. What do you do when you don't have the data to accurately price risk?
Relevant comments:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43366311
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42450680
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41664750 (top comment of this thread aggressively relevant)
> 2016 failure of DMSP 19 without replacement[edit] On 11 February 2016, a power failure left both the command-and-control subsystem and its backup without the ability to reach the satellite's processor, according to the U.S. Air Force Space Command investigation released in July 2016 that also announced that DMSP 5D-3/F19 was considered to be 'lost'. The satellite's data can still be used, until it ceases pointing the sensors towards the Earth. The satellite was the most recent on-orbit, having been launched on 3 April 2014.[15]
> The failure only left F16, F17 and F18 – all significantly past their expected 3–5 year lifespan – operational. F19's planned replacement was not carried out because Congress ordered the destruction of the already constructed F20 probe to save money by not having to pay its storage costs. It is unlikely that a new DMSP satellite would be launched before 2023; by then the three remaining satellites should no longer be operational.[16]
To anyone acting as if this is a surprise or they're suddenly caught out and have to switch to another provider, I have to wonder, with the writing on the wall for 8 years now, how have you not already updated your plans?
That's the guardian for you. Remove context. Generate hyperbole. Beg for money.
There is one operating satellite in this constellation, and congress voted to shut down the program in 2015.
The DMSP program was discontinued in 2015 by a vote in congress[1]. Virtually every working stallelite in this program has failed. As best as I can tell there's just a single working one specifically NOAA-19[2].
Instead the program has switched to JPSS[3] which is part of GEOSS[4].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Meteorological_Satelli... (scroll up slightly)
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOAA-19
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Polar_Satellite_System
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Earth_Observation_Syste...
Can we ask dang to change the title to something like "Blocking of key US satellite data could...."?
They all voted for this with extreme skew towards the current policies. What is the point of trying to save this satellite data if the very people most affected dont care for it?
There is no war on anyone, and this has nothing to do with Trump, DOGS, or Climate change. Rather there were too many satellite failures, leaving just a single operating one in orbit.
The administration of Florida has a war on the idea of climate change:
* "Ron DeSantis signs bill scrubbing ‘climate change’ from Florida state laws": https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/16/desa...
* "Florida Officials Barred from Referencing “Climate Change”: https://climate.law.columbia.edu/content/florida-officials-b...
This allows (certain) Florida politicians to put their head in the sand even more than they already have.
Also from NOAA: “Noaa said they would not affect the quality of forecasting.”
Decommissioning old sensors?
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-what-pro...
“The ATMS sounder that remains is far inferior to hurricane forecasters than the SSMIS instrument the Department of Defense is discontinuing. Unlike the SSMIS which scans at a continuous resolution, the quality of the ATMS degrades considerably on its edges, rendering the sounder useless for most operational hurricane forecasts. The example below shows the difference between the scans from both instruments for Hurricane Erick last Wednesday, June 18th.”
There is also a useful figure included.
The damage to weather prediction and climate research will go far beyond "decommissioning old sensors." We're talking about an abrupt end to nearly all science related to climate and weather in the US. Even if a future administration decides to turn funding back on, it will take a generation to rebuild the research community.
* Ok that's an oversimplification. They actually turn encryption on while the satellite is over certain areas. But if you're in the Continental US I think it's in the clear
I'm actually surprised that the successors to DMSP don't meet the same needs. Or is the problem that they do and the government just doesn't share that data?
"We can't actually say this was DOGE, so we're going to imply it using emotionally charged words, and 90% of folks with bad media literacy will come away thinking it was DOGE (just check the reddit comments)."
This in-vogue method of "lying without lying" is shockingly common nowadays, but apparently it's okay for media to lie because Bad Man Bad.
The article is saying it was DOGE. DOGE directly attacked our hurricane-forecasting capacity [1]. OMB, i.e. Vought, continues that attack [2].
Given the top three states by hurricane risk voted for Trump in ‘24 [3][4] this should make for an entertaining hurricane season. (Particularly if both a red and blue state get hit and request federal assistance.)
[1] https://apnews.com/article/national-weather-service-layoffs-...
[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOAA_under_the_second_presid...
[3] https://www.realtor.com/news/trends/states-most-at-risk-for-...
[4] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_president...
A lot of these important projects have a single point of failure - who is the president every four years. I wonder how we build institutions and resources resilient to that?
I realize privatization is an ugly word, but could some of this stuff be provided by the private sector?
Can we make it possible to fund initiatives in a multinational manner where countries contribute to these efforts, but if one country blinks out, then you still have it go along?
We already did. The legislative branch allocates funds for stuff that the people deem worthy. That budget becomes law. The Constitution says the "President shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." There's even a specific law that prevents the President from withholding Congressionally-approved funds.
What you are seeing here is not a lack of designed resilience, it's the wilful removal of that system.
A president cares about election every four years. Private sector cares about it every quarter. I doubt privatization is improvement if you want to focus on long term.
Yes, but the key man problem still exists. For instance, SpaceX could build/operate a network of weather satellites for various nations but the instability of the founder leads to similar issues.
HAFS is often the best
https://www.noaa.gov/news/new-noaa-system-ushers-in-next-gen...
European models assimilate in data from US satellites and vice versa
The GOES-R satellites seem to have equal or better resolution: https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atot/4/4/1520-042... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GOES-16
DMSP resolves to 600m, while GOES-R resolves to 500m (don't confuse it with the older GOES satellites mentioned in the article).