Saturday, March 24, 2012

Five science rockets wait for weather to clear

NASA has rescheduled the launch of five suborbital sounding rockets from the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia to Monday night with liftoff set between midnight and 5 a.m. EDT.

The rockets are part of the Anomalous Transport Rocket Experiment, a mission that will gather information needed to better understand the process responsible for the high-altitude jet stream located 60 to 65 miles above the surface of the Earth.

As part the mission, the five rockets will release a chemical tracer that will form milky, white clouds that allow scientists and the public to "see" the winds in space.  These clouds may be visible for up to 20 minutes by residents from South Carolina to southern New Hampshire and Vermont.

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