Dazzling Nighttime Rocket Launch Puts 29 Satellites In Orbit, a New Record

[Buster's Uncle]

Dazzling Nighttime Rocket Launch Puts 29 Satellites In Orbit, a New Record
SPACE.com
By Mike Wall, Senior Writer  1 hour ago



The ORS-3 mission blasts off the launchpad in a blaze of fire on Nov. 19, 2013



A spectacular rocket launch from Virginia's eastern shore late Tuesday (Nov. 19) lit up the night sky like an artifical sun, kicking off a record-breaking mission to put 29 satellites into orbit.

The Orbital Sciences-built Minotaur 1 rocket launched into space at 8:15 p.m. EST (0115 GMT Wednesday) from NASA's Wallops Flight Faciltiy in Virginia to begin the ORS-3 mission, which is run by the U.S. military's Operationally Responsive Space Office. The launch was expected to be visible to millions of observes along the U.S. East Coast, weather permitting.

After a 45-minute delay caused by an issue with a downrange tracking station, the Minotaur 1 roared to life, carving an arc of flame into the night sky that was likely visible along the East Coast from Maine down to Florida, and from as far inland as Indiana and Michigan, according to viewing maps provided by NASA and Orbital Sciences. [Launch Photos: Minotaur 1 Rocket Lights Up Night Sky]

The rocket toted a total of 29 satellites — the most ever delivered to orbit in a single launch, mission officials said. A so-called "PhoneSat" built by NASA and the first-ever satellite designed and built by high school students were among the spacecraft hitching a ride into orbit on the four-stage Minotaur 1 rocket.

ORS-3's primary payload was the U.S. Air Force's $55 million STPSat-3, which carries five separate experiments and sensors that will measure various aspects of the space environment. STPSat-3 is the second spacecraft launched under the military's Standard Interface Vehicle program, which aims to help reduce the cost and preparation time of key satellite missions.

"We continuously search for affordable launch options, including rideshare opportunities on government and commercial missions," Col. Todd Krueger, director of the Defense Department's Space Test Program, told reporters during a pre-launch press conference on Nov. 14.



A Minotaur 1 rocket rises into the Virginia sky on Nov. 19, 2013, carrying a record-breaking 29 satellites


"The ORS-3 mission is a critical opportunity for the Space Test Program to conduct more space R&D," Krueger added. "The projects that we're flying on ORS-3 will benefit tomorrow's national security space architecture by studying the space environment and providing advanced capabilities for the warfighter."

The other 28 satellites lofted by the Minotaur 1 are tiny craft called cubesats, which were built by a variety of institutions for a broad range of purposes. TJ3Sat, for example, is the first satellite designed and built by high-school students ever to reach orbit. (The students attend Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria, Va., hence the name.) 

NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., provided PhoneSat 2.4, the next step in the space agency's efforts to demonstrate the utility of cheap spacecraft based on off-the-shelf commercial smartphones.

NASA also contributed Firefly, a cubesat that will study lightning flashes around the globe.

"Firefly will gather up to a year of observations on the mysterious workings of lightning," Firefly principal investigator Doug Rowland, of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., said in a statement. "Lightning is so familiar we tend to take it for granted, but we really don’t know the details of how it works — even though it is a critical part of the global electric circuit, and has obvious social and technological effects."

To learn more about the satellites that launched today, check out this list provided by the Operationally Responsive Space Office.

In addition to the 29 satellites launched aboard the Minotaur 1 rocket, three other cubesats were deployed in orbit on Tuesday. Those three tiny satellites were launched from the Kibo Japanese laboratory on the International Space Station, NASA officials said. That brings the total number of cubesats launched on Tuesday up to 31 satellites, not including the larger STPSat-3. A fourth cubesat is due to be deployed from the International Space Station on Wednesday (Nov. 20).


http://news.yahoo.com/dazzling-nighttime-rocket-launch-puts-29-satellites-orbit-012759133.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Satellite Made By Virginia High School Students Blasts Into Space
Business Insider
By Paul Szoldra 1 hour ago



A Minotaur I rocket similar to the one launched on Tuesday.  NASA/Wallops Flight Faciity



The Air Force launched 29 satellites into orbit from a NASA facility in Virginia on Tuesday evening, and one of them is the first to be built entirely by high school students, CNN reports.

Students from Thomas Jefferson High School for Science & Technology in Alexandria, Va. built the  TJ 3 Sat, a small "nanosatellite" weighing approximately 3 pounds and measuring about four inches on each side.

It took them seven years to build.

"It used to be that kids growing up wanted to be an astronaut," Andrew Petro, program executive for small spacecraft technology at NASA, said in a statement to Space.com. "I think we might be seeing kids saying, what they want to do is build a spacecraft. The idea here is that they really can do that."

From CNN:

Once in orbit, the "TJ 3 Sat will allow students and amateur radio users the opportunity to send and receive data from the satellite. Students and other users from around the world will be able to submit text strings to be uploaded to the TJ 3 Sat website," according to Orbital Sciences Corp, the developer and manufacturer of the Minotaur rocket.

The main payload being delivered by the Minotaur I rocket is the Air Force's Space Test Program Satellite-3, according to CNN. The high-schoolers satellite is among 28 other smaller ones called CubeSats.


http://finance.yahoo.com/news/satellite-made-virginia-high-school-015758076.html

[Unorthodox]

 

[Geo]

Did you participate in one of those cubesat projects, UnO?

[Unorthodox]

Nope. 

[Geo]

Or perhaps the Air Force sat?

[Unorthodox]

Nope.  They'd never let me near a satelite.  Those are usually clean room projects. 

[Buster's Uncle]

Uno is involved in re-purposing old missile boosters...

[Unorthodox]

Past tense is probably appropriate at this point. 

[Geo]

Past tense is probably appropriate at this point.

You're doing missile warheads these days?

[Buster's Uncle]

Post-nuclear holocaust could be a Halloween theme...

[Unorthodox]

Don't know what I'm gonna be doing these days.  But, that one was the last I'll have a hand in putting up.  Maybe the last the program as a whole puts together, there's literally nothing on the schedule.  Trying to find something new, that's all.