CONTENTS 



Glossary vi 

 Abstract viii 



1 Introduction 1 



1.1 GOES system description 1 



1.1.1 What is GOES? 1 



1.1.2 How is the GOES system implemented? 1 



1.1.3 What does GOES do? 1 



1.1.3.1 Visible and Infrared Spin-Scan 1 

 Radiometer (VISSR) 



1.1.3.2 Retransmission of VISSR and WEFAX data 1 



1.1.3.3 Space Environment Monitoring (SEM) 2 



1.1.3.4 Command and telemetry 2 



1.1.3.5 Data collection 2 



1.1.4 Is there a standby satellite? 2 



1.1.5 Will service interruptions occur? 2 



1.2 Description of the Data Collection Subsystem 2 



1.2.1 How can an organization become a GOES/DCS 2 

 user? 



1.2.2 What does it cost? 3 



1.2.3 What geographical coverage is provided by 3 

 the DCS? 



1.2.4 What is the DCS message capacity? 3 



1.2.5 What type of user sensor platform can be used? 3 



1.2.6 How are transmitter frequency assignments 6 

 obtained? 



1.2.7 How do the sensor data reach the user? 6 



1.2.8 How is the DCS operation controlled? 7 



1.2.9 What data error probability can the DCS 8 

 user expect? 



1.2.10 Can a user achieve direct data readout from 8 

 the GOES satellite? 



2 A CLOSER LOOK AT THE DCS 



2.1 DCS general operation 10 



2.2 Sensor/platform interface 10 

 2.2.1 Sensor data format 10 



iix 



