# Aqua Teleconference November 1, 2007

**On the phone:**

*Project science*: Claire Parkinson (telecon chair), Steve Platnick,
Steve Graham

*Instruments*: Mous Chahine, Denis Elliott, Norman Loeb

*ESMO*: Angie Kelly

*HQ:* Cheryl Yuhas

## **Mission Ops (Kelly):** see distributed ppt file from B. Guit (on travel in CO) for details. 

[Major activities over last month:]{.underline}

-   10/1: Aura STM, Pasadena.

-   10/8: AIRS photometric cal.

-   10/18: Dual Thruster Module #2 (DTM-2) Anomaly Review Board kickoff.

-   10/29: AMSU-A channel 4 performance change reported by JPL.

-   10/31-11/1: DoD Surveillance Working Group mtg. in Colorado Springs
    (attended by B. Guit).

-   Ongoing IT Security/GS meetings - daily and weekly.

######## Planned Activities for Next Month

-   11/7: DMUM #31

-   Weekly Cabletron replacement WG and IT Security/GS meetings.

[Long-Term Plans]{.underline}

-   Aura Relocation. Plan is to re-locate Aura closer to Aqua (\~7-8 vs.
    15 min); would be achieved by atmospheric drag so would take about
    10 mos. The original 15 min separation was for downlink reasons, but
    now have additional antennae in Norway and Alaska. Working on
    getting approvals before the next Aura DMUM in December.

> CY: Also looking at other tweaks in A-Train configuration, e.g.,
> PARASOL plans for exiting the A-Train as fuel decreases, and CALIPSO
> view change (3° pitch to avoid crystal facet reflection) with
> coordination by CloudSat.

-   Single S/C Ops, Dump-N-Go, and Lights Dim ops: no changes.

## Spacecraft Anomalies

[]{.mark}

-   New: STM-2 Heater Anomaly observed in September. Final Anomaly
    Review Board report due by 12/1. No effect on spacecraft or
    instruments. Similar to Aura DTM-3 heater anomaly in Aug 2005.

## Instrument Anomalies

[]{.mark}

-   AMSU-A Channel 4. Gain decrease in ch 4 (and noise increase) over
    the last few weeks reported by JPL on 10/29. If noise increase
    continues, ch 4 could impact retrievals and might have to be
    declared non-operational. JPL and FOT monitoring the situation. See
    accompanying plots in ppt file provided by Denis Elliott, AIRS
    project instrument operations and calibration manager. See AIRS
    notes for further details.

-   AMSR-E motor current/torque. No changes. Current torque threshold
    was raised to 4.5 Nm in July 2007. QuikSCAT experienced similar
    behavior with its scatterometer antenna bearing assembly -- obtained
    a copy of the JPL anomaly investigation report from Honeywell. What
    we have seen on AMSR-E is apparently not indicative of impending
    failure but normal wear and tear. Continuing to monitor.

[Debris Collision Avoidance]{.underline}: No significant approaches for
Aqua in October.

[Spacecraft]{.underline}: status = green

[]{.mark}

[Instruments]{.underline}: status = green

[]{.mark}

[Data capture/L0 processing]{.underline}: green. No data losses in
October.

### 

### **Project Science (Parkinson, Platnick:):**

No particular items to discuss.

**Data system/EOSDIS:**

No report.

**CERES (Loeb):**

Instruments nominal. Next STM will be the week of Nov. 12 in British
Columbia.

**MODIS:**

No report.

**AMSR-E:**

No report.

### **AIRS/AMSU (Chahine, Elliott):**

DE: Put out two alerts regarding channel 4 gain issue: the AIRS users
and DB community. The decline had been very slow, but has accelerated
over the last month (e.g., slide 15 in Guit distribution). The NEdT
(slide 19) is increasing, up to about 0.75K currently (from 0.12K at
launch). We don't yet know what the cause is.

MC: We have been preparing for loss of AMSU channels; currently have an
AIRS-only algorithm that has been validated vs. use of AMSU. There are
conditions of cloudiness where AMSU is very helpful. We'd expect to get
the same temperature/moisture accuracy but would have less yield in
regions of high cloudiness. The loss of channel 4 (at \~800 mb) is not
expected to have a significant impact but we will be checking further.

MC: A 50^th^ anniversary celebration of the "Keeling curve" is coming up
this month in Hawaii. I'm going to look into seeing if it's possible to
get an AIRS mention/slide.

### **HQ (Yuhas):**

*See comments in Mission Ops "long term plans".*

**Outreach, web site, etc. (Graham):** No report.

I was in Paris a couple of weeks ago for the 3-week UNESCO meeting. NASA
was a key part of the conference. The Magic Planet was very
well-received. King and Abdalati both spoke. John Marburger (OSTP) was
there, along with two key NSF representatives.

**Next Telecon:** Thursday, December 6, 2007

Minutes are being placed on the following site:
<http://aqua.nasa.gov/minutes>. Corrections/additions should be sent to
Steve Platnick.