Jun 19 1999
From The Space Library
A Lockheed Martin Titan II rocket launched successfully, carrying JPL's QuikSCAT satellite. Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corporation had built QuikSCAT in 11 months, setting an industry record. JPL stated that the satellite had "opened its solar arrays as planned an hour after launch, and a tracking station in Norway acquired the first signal from the spacecraft 18 minutes later." NASA had originally scheduled the satellite's launch for November 1998, but delayed it when a Titan IVA exploded after launch, carrying a payload for the National Reconnaissance Office. NASA had postponed the QuikSCAT launch until engineers could determine whether Titan II used any of the hardware that had caused the explosion on the Titan IVA. Following the launch of a Titan IVB rocket that placed a Milstar satellite in a faulty orbit, NASA had again delayed the QuikSCAT's launch, pending investigation of the failure. The successfully launched QuikSCAT satellite was on a two-year mission with the option of a third year, to "gather about 400,000 detailed measurements of the speed and direction of winds over the ocean's surface." NASA intended the US$98 million mission to "improve weather forecasting and detect the onset of conditions like El Nino." Engineers had designed the QuikSCAT to radiate microwave pulses over wide areas and to listen for the pulses' echo. Those return signals would "allow scientists to determine wind speeds and directions at the surface of the oceans. Understanding the interaction [of wind and ocean circulation] is important for weather prediction." Under the terms of NASA's first contract using the Rapid Spacecraft Acquisition process, Ball Aerospace had provided the QuikSCAT spacecraft bus, launch interface, system integration, test, launch support, and two years of mission operations.
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