NOAA Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellites (POES) are three-axis-stabilized spacecrafts that are launched into an orbit 830-870 kilometers high, constantly circling the Earth in an almost north-south orbit, passing close to both poles. POES satellites from NOAA-6 offer 4 or 5 channel multispectral daily repetitive global coverage.
Image provided by: National Climatic Data Center

The NOAA-12 -14 belong to the TIROS series known as the advanced Television Infrared Observing System satellite (The first meteorological satellite was one of the TIROS family).