A small NASA suborbital rocket was successfully launched Saturday morning from Wallops Island, Va., carrying two student satellites.
The two small spacecraft, designed and built by university students in Kentucky and California, will fly in space for a short period this month to gather information that may be applied to future space vehicles.
The spacecraft flew on a NASA suborbital Terrier-Improved Malemute sounding rocket.
The two spacecraft, also known as cubesats, separated from the rocket approximately 77 miles above Earth 72 seconds after launch.
This is the first time two small satellites were placed in space by a sounding rocket. Past cubesat missions have used much larger rockets at higher cost.
“This capability could open a whole new chapter in fast, inexpensive access to space for small payloads,” said James Lumpp, director of space systems laboratory at the University of Kentucky and faculty advisor for the project.
Students from Kentucky Space (a consortium of Kentucky universities) and California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo, built the cubesats. The standard cubesat, a miniaturized satellite for space research, weighs around two pounds and is four inches in size.
Kentucky Space is a consortium of universities including: University of Kentucky, Morehead State University, University of Louisville, Murray State University, and the Kentucky Community and Technical College System.
The Kentucky cubesat, called ADAMASat, will test hardware and software intended for uses on another cubesat called KySat-1 scheduled for launch in November.
The Cal Poly cubesat tested an attitude determination system.
Students at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, as well as stations at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, Morehead State University and at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., monitored data during the flight.
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