Apr 18 2018

From The Space Library

MEDIA ADVISORY M18-063 NASA TV Updates Launch Coverage for Planet-Hunting Mission TESS

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) now is scheduled for launch at 6:51 p.m. EDT today, Wednesday, April 18, on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The launch originally had been scheduled for April 16.

Live NASA TV launch coverage begins at 6:30 p.m., and will be broadcast on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

The deadline for media accreditation for this launch has passed. For information about media accreditation, contact ksc-media-accreditat@mail.nasa.gov.

With TESS, NASA is taking the next step in the search for planets outside of our solar system. The mission will find exoplanets that periodically block part of the light from their host stars, events called transits. TESS will survey the nearest and brightest stars for two years to search for transiting exoplanets.