UPDATE: The launch has been rescheduled for Friday after Thursday’s planned launch was scrubbed due to high winds.
Look to the skies Thursday morning and you should see a Delta II rocket launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base with a NASA payload.
The United Launch Alliance rocket will be carrying a scientific satellite and three additional, secondary payloads.
“To see the launch, people in Santa Clarita should find a viewing location with an unobstructed view of the western half of the sky and begin looking from 6:20 to 6:23 a.m.,” said freelance aerospace writer, Brian Webb.
The satellites that the rocket is carrying will be used for the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission.
The mission will provide the most accurate, highest-resolution global measurements of soil moisture ever obtained from space and will detect whether the ground is frozen or thawed, according to a press release from NASA.
The data will be used to enhance scientists’ understanding of the processes that link Earth’s water, energy and carbon cycles.
“At first you will see an orange light rising, which is the main rocket burning,” said Webb. “After about a minute the rocket will dim and change in brightness to looking more like a moving white star. At about one minute and 50 seconds the rocket will climb high enough it will hit the suns rays and will make the exhaust plume light up. After four minutes it will wink out and disappear and the second stage will ignite but you won’t be able to see it with the naked eye.”
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21 Comments
Matson JamesWrath Medina
Lez do ett
Down
Shawn Buss
Shawn Buss
Adrian Chagoya we will be able to see this from our backyard. If we wake up in time. Figured your type of thing.
Adrian Chagoya we will be able to see this from our backyard. If we wake up in time. Figured your type of thing.
What time do I look for it
Did you read the article? 6:20 a.m.
We would prob be evacuated if we were camping!!! What time do you know??
It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a Jalama burger!!!
One of the last Delta II rockets. Flying just a few more times. :(
Mason Michael Small Alyssa Small
6:20 AM
>_< I'll be asleep
Worth getting up at 6:00am to watch!
Cloudy skies, missed it. Bummer.
I saw it.. But it was too the East
Don’t know what star you saw in the East, because Thursday’s launch was scrubbed. It has been rescheduled for Saturday.
NO CRAP? I saw a little white dot rise from the horizon got about plane flying altitude then it blanked out and it little red light shot from its side and immediately went out (like a booster burning out)
Correction: Friday
Seriously, to the East? My son and I got up and went to Starbucks on Golden Valley Rd. with a perfect view of the West, as the article stated. We parked, facing the West and waited. Of course, we saw nothing, thought it was the cloud coverage! So bummed! Sigh.