DMSP-F17

DMSP-F17 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program Flight 17, Block 5D-3) is a US Air Force operational meteorological satellite launched on 4 November 2006 by a Delta IV rocket into a sun-synchronous polar low Earth orbit at 848 km altitude and 98.8 degrees inclination, with a 06:35 descending equator crossing time.^[1] Planned end-of-life is September 2026.^[1]

The primary payload is the SSMIS (Special Sensor Microwave Imager/Sounder), a 24-channel conical-scanning passive microwave instrument spanning 19.35 to 183.311 GHz with a 1707 km swath, providing temperature and humidity sounding profiles and surface precipitation estimates for numerical weather prediction.^[2][1] Channel 54.4 GHz failed shortly after launch, channel 53.596 GHz failed in August 2013, and noise degradation in the temperature sounding channels was identified from October 2017 onward; NWP centres addressed these effects through bias correction schemes.^[1] The Operational Linescan System (OLS) provides visible and infrared cloud imagery for military weather support. The Space Environment Sensor Suite includes an ultraviolet limb imager, a magnetometer, a precipitating particle spectrometer, and an ionospheric plasma monitor; the UV spectrographic imager is inactive.^[1]

DMSP-F17 became the primary operational US military weather satellite after DMSP-F19 failed in February 2016.^[2] The US Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command (FNMOC) ceased distributing DMSP-F17 data in July 2025 due to cybersecurity considerations, while the satellite itself continued operating toward its planned September 2026 end-of-life.^[3]