NASA Television coverage of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) mission news briefing on Feb. 7 2015 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Participants in the prelaunch news conference were:
· Stephen Volz, assistant administrator of the NOAA Satellite and Information Service in Silver Spring, Maryland
· Tom Berger, director of the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center in Boulder, Colorado
· Steven Clarke, NASA Joint Agency Satellite Division director for the agency’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington
· Col. D. Jason Cothern, Space Demonstrations Division chief at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico
· Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of mission assurance at SpaceX in Hawthorne, California
· Mike McAlaneen, launch weather officer with the 45tth Weather Squadron at Cape Canaveral AFS
DSCOVR is a partnership between NOAA, NASA and the U.S. Air Force. DSCOVR will maintain the nation’s solar wind observations, which are critical to the accuracy and lead time of NOAA’s space weather alerts, forecasts, and warnings. Space weather events like geomagnetic storms, caused by changes in solar wind, can affect public infrastructure systems such as power grids, telecommunications systems, and aircraft avionics. DSCOVR will succeed NASA’s Advanced Composition Explorer in supporting solar observations and provide 15 to 60 minute warning time to improve predictions of geomagnetic storm impact locations.
