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Spire Plans To Use Tiny Satellites For More Accurate Weather Forecasts

Posted by timothy on from the up-in-the-air dept.

Zothecula writes Weather forecasting is a notoriously inexact science. According to San Francisco-based tech startup Spire, this is partially because there are currently less than 20 satellites responsible for gathering all of the world's weather data – what's more, some of the older ones are using outdated technology. Spire's solution? Establish a linked network of over 100 shoebox-sized CubeSats, that will use GPS technology to gather 100 times the amount of weather data than is currently possible. The first 20 of those satellites are scheduled to launch later this year.

4 of 24 comments (clear)

  1. I work in Earth-observing satellite ground systems by idontgno · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The last I looked, the state of remote-sensing algorithms for limb profiling (i.e., looking through the layer of the Earth's atmosphere over the limb of the planet from your orbital position) is something between bad and "are you kidding?".

    I wonder what kind of secret sauce these Young Turks have that NASA and NOAA doesn't?

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  2. A sense of scale by RightwingNutjob · · Score: 3, Insightful

    is missing in this notion. Meaningful Earth observation from space is done with cameras that take up more physical space than a cubesat. Yeah, you can squeeze several high definition cameras into a cubesat, but the moment you realize that you need something other than visible band, temperture control on the ccds, and the power-aperture to beam that stuff down to earth in a meaningful timeframe, you've built 1500lb worth of overhead around your tiny little cubesat and you're back in GOES and NPP land.

    1. Re:A sense of scale by mspohr · · Score: 5, Funny

      OMG! Quick somebody tell these people that the experts here at /. have decided that they are making a big mistake. I'm sure they will be grateful for all of the expert opinions of our hive mind since it will save them from making a BIG MISTAKE.
      (OTOH, you could RTFA.)

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  3. Re:I work in Earth-observing satellite ground syst by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 3, Informative

    The last I looked, the state of remote-sensing algorithms for limb profiling is something between bad and "are you kidding?".

    But they are not doing much "remote sensing". All they are doing is recording when a GPS signal is received. That's it. That shouldn't be too hard. The delay between when the GPS should have been received, and was actually received, will tell them the index of refraction of the atmospheric cord it passed through, and from that, a ground computer can calculate the humidity, temperature, and pressure.