Expendable Launch Vehicle Status Report

[KSC News Center <ksc@mediaservices.nasa.gov>]

Feb. 3, 2011

George H. Diller
Kennedy Space Center, Fla.
321-867-2468
george.h.diller@nasa.gov

STATUS REPORT: ELV-020311

EXPENDABLE LAUNCH VEHICLE STATUS REPORT

Spacecraft: Glory
Launch Vehicle: Taurus XL 3110
Launch Site:  Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif.
Launch Date:  Feb. 23, 2011
Launch Time: 2:09:43 a.m. PST
Altitude/Inclination: 440 miles/98.2 degrees 

At the Astrotech payload processing facility on north Vandenberg Air 
Force Base, prelaunch processing of the Glory spacecraft continues. 
Activities to encapsulate the satellite into the payload fairing are 
under way. Soon after Glory's arrival at the launch pad on Feb. 5, it 
will be attached horizontally to the Taurus XL third stage. The fully 
integrated "upper stack" consisting of the encapsulated Glory 
spacecraft with stages 1, 2 and 3 will later be hoisted atop the 
Taurus XL Stage 0, currently planned for Feb. 15.

The ELaNa CubeSat secondary payloads within their self-contained 
deployer also will be taken to the pad this weekend and integrated 
with the Taurus XL.

Flight Simulation No. 3 involving the upper stack is planned for Feb. 
8. The Combined Systems Test on Feb. 17 will test the entire launch 
vehicle once the upper stack has been integrated with Stage 0.

Data from the Glory mission will allow scientists to better understand 
how the sun and tiny atmospheric particles called aerosols affect 
Earth's climate. Both aerosols and solar energy influence the 
planet's energy budget -- the amount of energy entering and exiting 
Earth's atmosphere. An accurate measurement of these impacts is 
important in order to anticipate future changes to our climate and 
how they may affect human life.

Project management for Glory is the responsibility of NASA's Goddard 
Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. The launch management for the 
mission is the responsibility of NASA's Launch Services Program at 
the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Orbital Sciences Corporation of Dulles, Va., is the launch service 
provider to Kennedy of the four-stage Taurus XL rocket and is also 
builder of the Glory satellite for Goddard.

Previous status reports are available at:

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/launchingrockets/status/index.html 
 

	
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