New Lightning Mapper Imagery From GOES-16 Awes Meteorologists

Chris Dolce
Published: March 6,2017
New imagery released Monday from a lightning-detection instrument on board NOAA's recently launched GOES-16 satellite is the latest to awe meteorologists in recent weeks.
The Geostationary Lightning Mapper, or GLM, provides lightning data across the Western Hemisphere that forecasters have never had access to before.
(MORE: First Images From GOES-16)
This sample animated imagery from the GLM provided by NOAA was taken on Feb. 14, 2017, near the Texas Gulf Coast where severe storms pushed through and spawned tornadoes.
A still image from the above video clip shows two of the lightning flashes and the cloud canopy associated with the strong storms near Houston.

In the white box are two of the lightning flashes detected by the GLM on Feb. 14, 2017 along the Texas Gulf Coast.

The lightning mapper is another useful tool, which in combination with other weather data, forecasters can use to provide life-saving information to the public such as issuing warnings quicker. It will also capture lightning information for areas where that data is sparse, including over oceans, NOAA says.
Both cloud-to-ground and in-cloud lightning can be detected by the GLM. The ability to monitor in-cloud lightning is important because it often precedes cloud-to-ground strikes by 5-10 minutes, giving meteorologists the ability to alert of the danger in advance, NOAA reports.
But this is not the only imagery from GOES-16 in recent weeks to astonish meteorologists.
This animation of images taken every minute shows mesolows, or small-scale areas of low pressure, near eastern Lake Ontario in Upstate New York on March 3.
Tornado-producing thunderstorms billowing up high into the atmosphere were captured in this clip from Feb. 28 over northern Illinois and eastern Iowa.
GOES-16 was even able to see the moon's shadow cast on the earth during an eclipse in the Southern Hemisphere on Feb. 26.
There will surely be more striking imagery to come from GOES-16 in the weeks and months ahead as testing continues.
GOES-16 will eventually be renamed either GOES-East or GOES-West once NOAA decides its final position when it becomes operational this fall. GOES-S will be the next satellite to launch in the series of four and will be renamed GOES-17 before becoming either GOES-East or GOES-West.

MORE: The Earth As Art

The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.