Defense and aerospace giant Lockheed Martin has secured a USD 297 million NASA contract to design and build the next-generation GeoXO Lightning Mapper (LMX) instruments for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
NASA awarded the contract to Lockheed Martin on behalf of the NOAA, a US federal agency.
LMX is a single-channel, near-infrared optical instrument developed specifically to detect, locate, and measure the intensity, duration and extent of lightning flashes in near-real-time, according to a media release.
The LMX instrument detects and measures lightning flashes while onboard NOAA's GeoXO weather satellites. This lightning data will provide persistent severe weather observations of the Western Hemisphere, improving storm analysis and prediction and aiding the detection of tornado-producing storms. The imagers will improve hurricane intensity calculations, lightning hazard detection, wildfire ignition detection and aviation threat avoidance.
"Lockheed Martin improved upon the success of the Geostationary Lightning Mapper and added game-changing technologies to the GeoXO Lightning Mapper, including an advanced imaging sensor that will potentially detect 25% more lightning pulses," said Matthew Mahlman, director of Weather, Earth Science and Climate Intelligence at Lockheed Martin. "This advanced technology will give meteorologists a tool to create greater lead time in alerting people to severe storms and dangerous weather situations such as rapid intensifying hurricanes."
The GeoXO weather satellite system is NOAA's next generation of satellites following the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) series -- the last of which, GOES-U, launched on June 25, 2024.
In June, the US space agency awarded Lockheed Martin a contract to develop and build the GeoXO spacecraft for NOAA. The baseline contract is for three spacecraft with options for four additional spacecraft. The total estimated value of the contract including options is USD 2.27 billion, and the first launch is planned for the early 2030s.