The The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES)-16 observatory was launched on 19 November 2016. During daily on-orbit operations, shadowing of the inboard magnetometer sensor unit occurs due to spacecraft geometry and solar angle. Throughout the shadowing periods of the inboard magnetometer, anomalous excursions of 20 nanotesla (nT) are observed. In addition to the excursions during shadow events, the measurement difference between the inboard and outboard magnetometer varies over the day, indicating erroneous measurements by one or both magnetometers. In addition, based on the deployment rotations, the zero offsets of the X and Y axes were found to be significantly different, ~30nT, from ground calibration data.Because of these observations, an extensive root cause investigation was undertaken to correct the magnetometer system for the next spacecraft in the GOES-R series. This paper documents the efforts of that activity and the lessons learned as a result of the investigation.

Abstract. The results of a destructive single-event effect susceptibility radiation test of the PNI RM3100 magnetometer sensor, specifically the MagI2C ASIC (application specific integrated circuit) on the sensor board are presented. The sensor is a low-resource commercial-of-the-shelf (COTS) magneto-inductive magnetometer. The device was monitored for destructive events and functional interruptions during exposure to a heavy ion beam at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s 88” Cyclotron. The RM3100 did not experience any destructive single-event effects when irradiated to a total fluence of 1.4 x 107/cm2 at an effective linear energy transfer (LET) of 76.7 MeVcm2/mg while operated at nominal voltage (3.3 V) and elevated temperature (85 °C). When these results are combined with previous total ionizing dose tests showing no failures up to 150 kRad(SI), we conclude that the PNI RM3100 is extremely radiation tolerant and can be used in a variety of space environments.