__NOTOC__ The Spaceflight Meteorology Group (SMG) is a U.S.

weather forecast Weather forecasting is the application of science and technology to predict the conditions of the atmosphere for a given location and time. People have attempted to predict the weather informally for millennia and formally since the 19th cent ...

ing unit staffed by the

National Weather Service The National Weather Service (NWS) is an agency of the United States federal government that is tasked with providing weather forecasts, warnings of hazardous weather, and other weather-related products to organizations and the public for the ...

(NWS) for the

National Aeronautics and Space Administration The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding ...

(NASA) which provides pertinent information on the current and expected state of the

atmosphere An atmosphere () is a layer of gas or layers of gases that envelop a planet, and is held in place by the gravity of the planetary body. A planet retains an atmosphere when the gravity is great and the temperature of the atmosphere is low. ...

during human spaceflight operations. It is located at the

Johnson Space Center The Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) is NASA's center for human spaceflight (originally named the Manned Spacecraft Center), where human spaceflight training, research, and flight control are conducted. It was renamed in honor of the late ...

(JSC) in

Houston Houston (; ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in Texas, the Southern United States#Major cities, most populous city in the Southern United States, the List of United States cities by population, fourth-most pop ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

Meteorological Meteorology is a branch of the atmospheric sciences (which include atmospheric chemistry and physics) with a major focus on weather forecasting. The study of meteorology dates back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not ...

information for the broader space program is provided by the 45th Space Wing's 45th Weather Squadron of the U.S. Air Force (USAF). SMG covered

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program na ...

missions and was planned to cover Orion missions. Following the landing of

Space Shuttle Atlantis Space Shuttle ''Atlantis'' (Orbiter Vehicle designation: OV‑104) is a Space Shuttle orbiter vehicle which belongs to NASA, the spaceflight and space exploration agency of the United States. ''Atlantis'' was manufactured by the Rockwell ...

during

STS-135 STS-135 (ISS assembly flight ULF7) was the 135th and final mission of the American Space Shuttle program. It used the orbiter '' Atlantis'' and hardware originally processed for the STS-335 contingency mission, which was not flown. STS-135 l ...

on July 21, 2011, many of the SMG forecasters were relocated elsewhere in the National Weather Service, leaving a reduced staff at JSC. The Spaceflight Meteorology Group is also tasked with forecasting emergency landings for

Soyuz Soyuz is a transliteration of the Cyrillic text Союз ( Russian and Ukrainian, 'Union'). It can refer to any union, such as a trade union (''profsoyuz'') or the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (Сою́з Сове́тских Социали� ...

missions when those rendezvous with the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest Modular design, modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos ( ...

(ISS).

References

External links

Spaceflight Meteorology Group (SMG)

Human Spaceflight - Weather forecasts
(NASA)
Applied Meteorology Unit (AMU)
(NASA) {{authority control National Weather Service NASA Governmental meteorological agencies in North America

See also

References

Further reading

External links