Photo courtesy of Virgin Orbit/Greg Robinson
ExoCube 2 is among 10 small satellites flying aboard Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne rocket
–A Cal Poly San Luis Obispo CubeSat will ride on Wednesday Jan. 13 aboard Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne rocket on its second attempt to reach space.
The rocket includes nine other NASA-sponsored small satellites on the space agency’s next Educational Launch of Nanosatellites (ELaNa) mission. This is the first payload carried by Virgin Orbit’s rocket that will be carried aloft under the wing of a modified Boeing 747 to an altitude of 35,000 feet, released and fired into orbit.
The mothership jet, named Cosmic Girl, will take off from Mojave Air and Space Port, which will release the two-stage LauncherOne off the coast of Southern California. The launch window is 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. Pacific Time, “with additional windows throughout January if needed,” the company announced.
Early 2021: India launches its Chandrayaan-3 rover to the moon ISRO chairman Kailasavadivoo Sivan displays a model of the Chanrayaan-2 orbiter and rover on August 20, 2019. AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) plans to re-attempt a moon landing in 2021. During its first mission of this kind, in September 2019, the Chandrayaan-2 lander lost communications on descent and crashed into the lunar surface.
But that mission s orbiter is still circling the moon and seems to be in good health. If all goes according to plan, the Chandrayaan-3 lander will reach the lunar south pole, communicate with the orbiter, and pick up where Chandrayaan-2 left off.
By Danielle Sempsrott
NASA’s Kennedy Space Center
MOJAVE, Calif. Ten NASA-sponsored CubeSats are preparing to fly on the agency’s next Educational Launch of Nanosatellites (ELaNa) mission, making this the first payload carried by Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne rocket.
With the small satellites safely secured inside the payload fairing, and the fairing mated to the rocket, Virgin Orbit is gearing up for ELaNa 20, the Launch Demo 2 flight from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California.
“This initiative actually enables the market for future CubeSats or future missions needing a ride to space by providing different approaches and different options to better meet spacecraft needs,” Hector Viera, NASA’s contracting officer representative for Virgin Orbit. “This launch is going to open the doors for them (Virgin Orbit) and for NASA, and that’s a good thing.”
Universities prepare to launch experiments with NASA, Virgin Orbit
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Technicians prepare small satellites for launch at Virgin Orbit s processing facility in Mojave, Calif. Photo courtesy of Virgin Orbit
Technicians prepare a small satellite, MiTEE, for launch in California after it was built and shipped by the University of Michigan. Photo courtesy of Virgin Orbit
Quartz marbles and smaller material are packed inside the Q-PACE small satellite for an experiment in microgravity. Photo courtesy of University of Central Florida
ORLANDO, Fla., Dec. 16 (UPI) Experiments on a NASA educational satellite mission planned this month include two devices intended to inspect other spacecraft in space, a box of quartz marbles that will float in microgravity and a weather observation satellite to monitor storms.