GOES Data Files

Files of Zip-compressed ASCII data listings containing Dipole VDH magnetic field data from GOES satellites are available for retrieval. The on-line selection roughly spans Jan 1, 1983, through Dec 31, 1988. Decompressed (i.e. ASCII text) data is also available for alternate viewing for DOY 248 (Sep 4) of 1984.

The files, which are partioned by individual days within subdirectories, are accessible through the following hot spot:

Get DATA FILES here.

Zip Data Compression Utility

All data files were compressed using the zip format. A freeware decompression application program, Unzip, is available from the Info-ZIP workgroup which maintains this utility for a range of hardware platforms. Zip and Unzip are compatible with the DOS-based PKZIP by PKWARE, Inc.

For MacIntosh Netscape users, place your Unzip application program in your Netscape Helpers folder if you download it from the Info-ZIP workgroup site. When you click on the first GOES zip file, Netscape will inform you that it is does not know this format and will allow you to pick an application to interpret it. Choose Unzip from the Netscape Helpers folder. Afterwards make sure to set Unzip in Helpers of the General Preferences (Options pull-down) to have Mime type: application, Subtype: zip, Extensions: zip, File type: .zip, and optionally Action: Launch Application.

Data File Descriptions

There are files of two time resolutions for each day:

High resolution (Master) data: 3-second resolution with filename MGnnyrdoyA.zip
Low resolution (Summary) data: 60-second resolution with filename SGnnyrdoyA.zip

where descriptive components within the filename are:

nn is the GOES-nn satellite number (e.g. GOES-5, GOES-6, GOES-7),
yr is the year of the data,
doy is the day of year of the data.

For example, MG0584248A.zip contains compressed 3-second magnetic field data from the GOES-5 satellite for September 4, 1984.

Data File Contents

Each ASCII data file contains:

A single header line containing:
- the GOES satellite name
- the two-digit year of the file
- the three-digit day of year (DOY) of the file
- the satellite longitude in geographic coordinates
- the data descriptor 1-m Dipole VDH for the subsequent data
Multiple lines of measurement data, each containing:
- the seconds of day for the data
- the V data component
- the D data component
- the H data component

Each file usually contains 24 hours of data.

Here's an example of a 60-second GOES-5 resolution data listing for DOY 248 (Sep 4) of 1984.

Stipulations

Users with scientific questions may contact either David Sibeck at APL (david.sibeck@jhuapl.edu) or Howard Singer at SEL (hsinger@sec.noaa.gov).
Users wishing to order data sets for other intervals and other satellites should contact the NGDC. For information, see the GOES Web page at http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov:80/stp/GOES/goes.html.

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Accesses sinse June 6, 1996