NASA to launch Terrier rocket from Wallops Island

[mahatmakanejeeves]

NASA to launch Terrier rocket from Wallops Island

WUSA 9 Staff, WUSA 6:35 a.m. EDT August 11, 2015

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. (WUSA9) -- The launch window is now open at Wallops Island, Virginia. NASA plans to send up a sub-orbital rocket sometime this week between 6 and 10 a.m.

The Terrier-Improved Malemute suborbital sounding rocket is carrying experiments from several schools, including Virginia Tech. The team built their own 3D printer to operate in space with the intention of collecting information about the effects of changing gravitational loads on 3D printing. Virginia Tech will then share their results and make any improvements to their 3D printer design based on those results.

The rocket is expected to reach an altitude of 94 miles and people along the Eastern Shore should get a good view of it.

Click here for more information about the rocket.

If there's no clear window to launch Tuesday, the launch could happen Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday.

[TexasProgresive]

1. I could've taken a job in the Wallops Station control room in 1971

Instead I took a job in the instrument shop. I did various wire bending and burning jobs in the control room and let me tell you I am glad I didn't work there. The weather is atrocious on the eastern shore with the Atlantic on one side and the Chesapeake on the other. They would schedule a launch and the control room crew would come in the wee hours of the morning and the weather would turn bad, so they would set it up again and again and again.

That said, my time working at Wallops station (on the main land) and visits to the island were some of the most rewarding work I have ever done. My only regret about not taking the control room job is not going to Kenya. There was a tracking station there that that crew manned rotating 6 weeks at a time. I would love to have spent time in East Africa.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

2. Science!