A Delta IV rocket was launched from Space Launch Complex-37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Base in Florida on Thursday evening. Launched by the United Launch Alliance, the Delta IV rocket is carrying the seventh of 10 United States Air Force satellites into orbit. The 217-foot rocket was launched at 8:07 p.m. EDT.
United Launch Alliance began launching the WGS satellites in 2007. Working with Delta and Atlas, United Launch Alliance has launched about 13,000 missions in the last 50 years. The New Horizons rocket, which recently sent data to Earth containing images of Pluto’s surface, was launched by United Launch Alliance in 2006. They have also launched 10 Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites for the United States Air Force as well as the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle, a reliable, reusable, unmanned space test platform .
Referred to as the “ 21st century launch solution ” by its manufacturer, United Launch Alliance, The Delta IV rocket “combines design simplicity, manufacturing efficiency, and streamlined mission and vehicle integration to meet customer requirements to launch high-priority U.S. Air Force, National Reconnaissance Office, NASA, and commercial payloads to orbit.”
NASA has selected the United Launch Alliance’s Delta IV rocket for a mission scheduled to launch in 2018. The mission is to launch the Solar Probe Plus so it can collect and transmit data from a near-sun environment. Jim Sponnick, United Launch Alliance vice president, is eagerly anticipating the upcoming launch.
“The ULA team is very proud that NASA has selected the Delta IV Heavy launch vehicle for this extraordinary science mission. The Delta IV Heavy rocket is uniquely qualified to provide the launch service for this vital science mission that will help us understand processes near the surface of the sun that affect space weather and radiation environments. We look forward to successfully delivering this critical spacecraft to orbit for NASA.”
The rocket detached from its satellite payload about 42 minutes after launch while in the skies east of Madagascar. The satellite will orbit about 22,000 miles above Earth’s surface, far into the thermosphere, the outermost layer of Earth’s atmosphere.
Once it is in orbit, the satellite will become a part of the Wideband Global SATCOM network, or WGS.
“As the backbone of the U.S. military’s global satellite communication,” states the Los Angeles Air Force Base, “WGS provides worldwide flexible, high data rate and long haul communications for marines, soldiers, sailors, airmen, the White House Communication Agency, the US State Department, international partners, and other special users.”
The satellite launched today is expected to have a 14-year lifespan and will travel over 900 million miles during that time.
[Image via United Launch Alliance]