SAN FRANCISCO - The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has decided that watching paint dry is more fun than relying on its current weather satellites, so it's extending its contract with Spire Global for a hyperspectral microwave sounder by another six months, to the tune of $3 million. The extension, announced Aug. 4, means NOAA will keep evaluating data from Spire's Hyperspectral Microwave Sounder (HyMS) to see if it can improve numerical weather prediction. The work will assess sensor performance across a broader range of atmospheric conditions and seasonal weather patterns, while evaluating the impact of the data on forecast accuracy and atmospheric profiling - because why not make weather forecasting slightly less of a guessing game?

Traditionally, passive microwave sensors have been the workhorses of numerical weather prediction (NWP), but they have a flaw: they lack the vertical resolution to capture fine atmospheric structures. Hyperspectral microwave sensor technology, on the other hand, uses high-spectral resolution in sounding microwave bands, allowing improved observations in all-weather conditions. In other words, it's like upgrading from a blurry flip phone camera to a 4K drone shot of the atmosphere.

HyMS captures atmospheric observations across more than 2,000 sensing channels, enabling high-vertical-resolution atmospheric profiling while being resilient to radio frequency interference. These capabilities could provide weather agencies with more detailed, reliable observations, especially in regions where traditional observations are limited. Spire CEO Theresa Condor touted the potential, saying hyperspectral microwave sounding from a scalable commercial constellation promises to unlock a new tier of global weather data. She added, in a statement dripping with corporate optimism, "We're proud to expand our work with NOAA as we demonstrate how commercial innovation and resilient atmospheric data can power the next era of global weather forecasting."

Since its launch in January, the HyMS demonstrator mission has already proven it can collect high-quality hyperspectral microwave observations from orbit, according to Mohammad Belal, Spire's microwave technologies program director. This extension allows them to evaluate those observations across a much broader range of conditions and seasons, helping to understand how the data can improve NWP and complement existing systems. The contract also includes an unfunded option for three more months of data, valued at $2 million - because who doesn't love an optional extra with a price tag attached?

This isn't Spire's first rodeo with NOAA: in 2022, the company won a $4 million contract to develop the HyMS in-orbit demonstrator. So, in total, that's $7 million spent on a device that might make weather forecasts slightly more accurate. But hey, who are we to question the price of knowing whether to bring an umbrella?