Second Space Age - Orbital Sciences Corporation

If you live on the east coast of the United States then it's likely that over the past year you've been introduced to the work of one of the major players in the Second Space Age, Orbital Sciences Corporation. (If you don't live in that area or have never heard of them, please read on anyway!) They've built and operated the various rockets that have been flying out of NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on the eastern shore of Virginia. Their launches have caught the attention of the public lately thanks to their frequent night-time launch windows (the short time that physics dictates as just the right time to launch a particular mission).

Orbital Sciences is one of two companies contracted by NASA to deliver supplies and new science experiments to the International Space Station under the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. (We'll discuss the other company in the near future.) Based in Dulles, VA, Orbital Sciences was founded in 1982 and has developed an impressive reputation in the small- and medium-class satellite business, having produced about 140 satellites with two primary focuses. The first is communications and the second is remote sensing which means using instruments aboard the satellite to make measurements and observations of Earth which can be used in scientific studies, military operations, and commercial uses like urban planning and farming.

They've also been building and flying rockets very successfully, and interesting ones at that! Their Pegasus rocket has a triangular wing and is launched horizontally after being dropped by a Lockheed L-1011 carrier plane at 40,000 feet. This has the great advantage of getting the rocket above the thickest part of the atmosphere so the rocket experiences less resistance and it's above most of the weather so the odds of being able to launch are increased greatly.

The rockets that have been catching the public's attention, however, are the Minotaurs (like the one used to launch LADEE a few months ago) that Orbital Sciences have created by acquiring decommissioned US Air Force Minuteman and Peacekeeper missiles and using them as the first two stages then mounting their own flight-proven rockets and computers on top with their satellite payloads. This gets to the heart of what Orbital Sciences does often and does well: assembling pieces that have excellent success rates and are readily available. In this way they are able to put together launch vehicles that are safe, reliable, capable, and cost-effective. That is a crucial ability for any company hoping to hold a position as major player in the satellite launch world and especially when helping pioneer commercial cargo service to our space station.

The next entry will be about Orbital Sciences' newest rocket, the Antares, which will be launching this Wednesday, January 8th, and later in the week I'll introduce you to do Cygnus cargo vehicle that is serving as one of two  commercial resupply vessels for the International Space Station.

If you have any questions about Orbital Sciences or anything referenced here please leave a comment!

LADEE: A Flight of Firsts (Part 2) The Minotaur V

The first flight of the Orbital Sciences Minotaur V
 
    The LADEE mission will be riding its way to space aboard a rocket called the Minotaur V, the fifth in a series of rockets that increases its lofting capability with each successive generation. The fifth generation also happens to be a five-stage rocket, meaning five rocket segments that fire successively. When each stage is done firing it is detached from the rocket and left to burn up in the atmosphere. Staging allows the rocket to dump the dead weight and maintain efficiency as it reaches higher altitudes. 

   The Minotaur family of rockets have come into existence as a result of the US military's decommissioning of Minuteman and Peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), once in place as our nuclear deterrent against the Soviet Union. The Orbital Sciences corporation was contracted by the US Air Force to convert these missiles into orbital and sub-orbital launchers. They have been used to put satellites into orbit and as targets for anti-ballistic missile tests during which the Air Force practices destroying an incoming, hostile missile. The first three stages of these rockets use solid propellants which make them very safe to work with, stable for long-term storage, and reliable when fired. In fact, the Minotaur family has a 100% success rate to date.
    This launch is the first time that the five-stage configuration will be employed for this family of rockets. To be completely honest, this is not a high-risk "first" because the two commercially developed upper stages have been flow successfully before, however, that's no guarantee that it will be smooth sailing. Each rocket stage has its own computer that controls its ignition and operations and if these computers do not work together properly the vehicle could very well destroy itself, though that is a very unlikely scenario for the Minotaur V. Here's wishing the best of luck to the Orbital Sciences team!

For more detailed information about the Minotaur V rocket, visit Orbital Sciences' fact sheet.


Tomorrow's Topic: Look out Kennedy Space Center, the Mid Atlantic Spaceport is getting busy!