It was launched in 1997, and after completing operations as part of the main GOES system, it was kept online as a backup spacecraft until December 2009, providing coverage of South America as GOES-SOUTH, and being used to assist with hurricane predictions for North America.

At launch, the satellite had a mass of 2,105 kilograms (4,641 lb), and an expected operational lifespan of five years.

[5] During on-orbit testing, the system used to rotate the solar array in order to track the Sun started to malfunction.

Following two months of analysis, it was determined that it had only stopped working in one direction, so the satellite was rotated 180 degrees, and the array operated in reverse.

Less than a month later, it was reactivated after the attitude control system on the GOES-9 satellite started to fail.