{"id":15252,"date":"2016-09-07T23:07:14","date_gmt":"2016-09-07T15:07:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/photos-asteroid-probe-encapsulated-mounted-atop-atlas-5-for-launch\/"},"modified":"2016-09-07T23:07:14","modified_gmt":"2016-09-07T15:07:14","slug":"photos-asteroid-probe-encapsulated-mounted-atop-atlas-5-for-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/photos-asteroid-probe-encapsulated-mounted-atop-atlas-5-for-launch\/","title":{"rendered":"Photos: Asteroid probe encapsulated, mounted atop Atlas 5 for launch"},"content":{"rendered":"

Technicians inched the two halves of the Atlas 5\u2019s aluminum nose cone around NASA\u2019s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft to package the asteroid sample return probe, then moved the satellite to the rocket\u2019s assembly building and hoisted it aboard the two-stage booster during the final days of August for the Sept. 8 launch. <\/p>\n

The United Launch Alliance rocket will provide the boost that the probe needs for its Earth departure, embarking on a two-year outbound leg to reach Asteroid Bennu in August 2018. <\/p>\n

After orbiting a mere 5,000 feet above the asteroid\u2019s surface, then closing to 3,300 feet to map and survey Bennu for more than a year, the craft will perform a touch-and-go maneuver to capture up to four pounds of soil in July 2020. The specimen will be stowed in a decent capsule that lands in Utah on Sept. 24, 2023.<\/p>\n

With no problems being worked on the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft or Atlas 5 launch vehicle, encapsulation was accomplished on Wednesday, Aug. 24 inside the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA\u2019s Kennedy Space Center.<\/p>\n

The payload fairing, measuring 14 feet in diameter and 39 feet long, shields the satellite during the climb through Earth\u2019s atmosphere. It will be jettisoned four minutes and 27 seconds into flight.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the next major step in getting to the launch pad,\u201d said Dante Lauretta, OSIRIS-REx principal investigator with the University of Arizona. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut I\u2019ve come to really enjoy visiting the spacecraft and seeing it grow up. I mean literally, I was there when they were casting the composites for the decks and the core cylinder and saw it as a scattered bunch of pieces in the laboratory, which was the first time we had real hardware that wasn\u2019t just something on a PowerPoint chart.<\/p>\n

On Friday, Aug. 26, the shrouded spacecraft was lifted aboard the transport trailer that would haul OSIRIS-REx to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station\u2019s Complex 41 and the doorway of Atlas 5\u2019s Vertical Integration Facility. That move and subsequent mating to the rocket occurred as planned on Monday, Aug. 29.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a beautiful spacecraft, it really has behaved very well for us. So I\u2019m happy to send it on the journey to Bennu and back, but I\u2019m also going to miss just the awesome engineering that is the privilege of this position,\u201d Lauretta said.<\/p>\n

Photo credit: NASA<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\"fairing01\"<\/p>\n

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See earlier OSIRIS-REx coverage.<\/p>\n

Our Atlas archive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Technicians inched the two halves of the Atlas 5\u2019s aluminum nose cone around NASA\u2019s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft to package the asteroid sample return probe, then moved the satellite to the rocket\u2019s assembly building and hoisted it aboard the two-stage booster during the final days of August for the Sept. 8 launch. The United Launch Alliance rocket […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3428,724,3600,2858,3169,190,1527,750],"class_list":["post-15252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-asteroid-bennu","tag-atlas-5","tag-av-067","tag-encapsulation","tag-lift-and-mate","tag-nasa","tag-osiris-rex","tag-united-launch-alliance"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15252"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15252\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}