WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. – A Terrier Improved-Malemute suborbital sounding rocket launched from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wednesday morning after Tuesday’s scheduled launch was scrubbed due to boats being present in the hazard area off the coast.
The rocket launched around 7:35 a.m.
The rocket will carry experiments developed by college students participating in the RockSat-X program in conjunction with the Colorado Space Grant Consortium.
Participating institutions in this flight are the University of Colorado, Boulder; Northwest Nazarene University, Nampa, Idaho; the University of Puerto Rico (UPR); the University of Nebraska, Lincoln; Virginia Tech, Blacksburg; Capitol Technology University, Laurel, Maryland; Carthage College, Kenosha, Wisconsin; and University of Hawai’i Community Colleges at the Honolulu, Kapi’olani, Kaua’i, and Windward campuses.
The RockSat-X program allows students to build experiments for spaceflight and requires them to expand their skills to develop more complex projects. The experiments are flown approximately 20 miles higher in altitude than those in the RockOn and RockSat-C programs, providing more flight time in space.
After flying to around 95 miles altitude, the payload, with the experiments, descended by parachute and landed 15 minutes after launch in the Atlantic Ocean, about 63 miles off the Virginia coast.
