Launch Of NASA's NuSTAR Mission Postponed

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

March 16, 2012

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

Trent J. Perrotto
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-0321
trent.j.perrotto@nasa.gov

Whitney Clavin 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-4673
whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov

MEDIA ADVISORY: M12-045

LAUNCH OF NASA'S NUSTAR MISSION POSTPONED

WASHINGTON -- The planned launch of NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic 
Telescope Array (NuSTAR) mission has been postponed after a March 15 
launch status meeting. The launch will be rescheduled to allow 
additional time to confirm the flight software used by the launch 
vehicle's flight computer will issue commands to the rocket as 
intended.

The spacecraft will lift off on an Orbital Sciences Pegasus XL rocket, 
which will be released from an aircraft taking off from the Reagan 
Test Site on the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The time 
required to complete the software review has moved NuSTAR beyond the 
March time frame currently available on the range at Kwajalein. In 
the interim, NASA will coordinate with the launch site to determine 
the earliest possible launch opportunity. This is expected to be 
within the next two months.

NuSTAR will use advanced optics and detectors, allowing astronomers to 
observe the high-energy X-ray sky with much greater sensitivity and 
clarity than any mission flown before. The mission will advance our 
understanding of how structures in the universe form and evolve. It 
will observe some of the hottest, densest and most energetic objects 
in the universe, including black holes, their high-speed particle 
jets, ultra-dense neutron stars, supernova remnants and our sun.

For more information about NuSTAR, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/nustar 

	
-end-



To subscribe to the list, send a message to: 
ksc-subscribe@newsletters.nasa.gov
To remove your address from the list, send a message to:
ksc-unsubscribe@newsletters.nasa.gov