ULA Launches NASA and NOAA's GOES-T Weather Satellite

GOES-T lifts off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 41 at 4:38 p.m. EST on Tuesday, March 1, 2022. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett

On Tuesday, March 1 at 4:38am ET (21:38 UTC), the United Launch Alliance (ULA) launched NASA and NOAA's GOES-T satellite atop an Atlas V 541 rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 (SLC-41) at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. GOES-T is the 18th satellite of the GOES series of weather satellites. It is the third of four next generation GOES-R satellites (-R, -S, -T, and -U) designed to (the following frpm Next Spaceflight) "advanced imagery and atmospheric measurements of Earth’s weather, oceans and environment, real-time mapping of total lightning activity, and improved monitoring of solar activity and space weather." Once GOES-T reaches geostationary orbit, it will be renamed GOES-18 and take the place of GOES-17 as GOES West. Atlas V was originally developed by Lockheed Martin before Lockheed Martin and Boeing entered a joint venture named the United Launch Alliance. In Atlas V 541, "5" means that the payload fairing has a diameter of 5 meters (Atlas V can have a diameter of 4 0r 5 meters.). "4" means that it has four solid rocket boosters and "1" means that the Centaur upper stage has a single engine. This was the 149th ULA mission, 92nd Atlas V launch, and the 22nd orbital launch attempt of 2022.