At about 17:40 UTC today NOAA-18 was permanently shut down. This is the last APT image it was transmitting, you can see where it stops. I recorded this using an openwebrx station because it was too far north for me to receive. Thanks to the openwebrx server for letting me record this event: http://sa2kng.ddns.net:8073/
I’m a complete novice, so for anyone else who’s curious, it was launched May 20, 2005 and had an expected lifespan of 5 years. It’s was already serving in a secondary capacity having been replaced by newer versions. So not quite as sad/scary as it seems when I was fully ignorant.
It's a problem for hobbiest satellite reception. None of these new satellites (except the russian ones) have 137MHz or l-band(1.7Ghz) transmissions, requiring much more complex and expensive X-band equipment to receive, this is one of the three remaining US weather satellites that transmits on 137Mhz and l-band lost. leaving 2 US (137MHz/l-band), 2 EU (l-band only), 3 russian (2 137MHz/l-band, 1 l-band only)