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United Launch Alliance plans to assemble remaining parts for a Delta 2 rocket show at the Kennedy Space Center's Florida visitor complex, alongside other icons of American rocketry, the company announced Saturday shortly after the launch. final launch of Delta 2.
"Just because we recently launched a Delta 2 takeoff for the last time does not mean we have to say goodbye," said Tory Bruno, President and CEO of ULA. "I am delighted to announce that the latest Delta 2 rocket will soon take its place in the historic Rocket Garden rocket range as a NASA Kennedy Space Center tourist complex in Florida."
"Thank you, United Launch Alliance," said Darlene Koenig, vice president of new business development at KSC Visitor Complex. "Delta 2's legacy will always be in the hearts and souls of our guests."
The latest Delta 2 flight delivered NASA's ICESat 2 ice, cloud and ground-lift satellite at 6:22 am PDT (9:02 am local time) at the Vandenberg Air Force base. , in California. EDT; 1302 GMT).
Designed to measure the height and slope of terrestrial and marine ice, ICESat 2 carries 10,000 times a second a laser pointing the Earth and a telescope to collect laser photons that bounce off the surface of the planet and into space. By accurately measuring the time it takes for the laser to reach Earth and return to the satellite, scientists can determine the extent of ice over the world's oceans, the height of the canopy, and the state of freshwater reservoirs. .
But ice measurements are the driving reason behind ICESat 2, which will extend a series of data recorded by a previous satellite, ICESat, which ended its observations in 2009. Scientists say the ICESat mission has melted in Greenland and Antarctica. found sea ice all over the world.
Saturday's launch raised the number of successful Delta 2 flights to 100, and 153 of 155 Delta 2 launches since 1989 have been successful.
Spaceflight Now has covered 68 Delta 2 missions since 2000. Our Delta 2 coverage can be viewed here and here.
The basic design of the Delta 2 originated in the mid-range Thor missile ballistic missile in the late 1950s. Engineers re-evaluated the Thor missile by adding a series of higher performing upper stages, expanding the size of its tanks propellant and installing solid belt thrusters to transport heavier satellites into orbit.
Thor's evolution into a reliable satellite launcher culminated in the Delta 2 rocket, which debuted in 1989 and launched 48 GPS navigation satellites, Mars rovers, interplanetary probes and numerous military and military payloads. of communications.
Read our previous story for more details on the legacy of Delta 2.
The Delta 2 was last launched at Cape Canaveral on September 8, 2011, with NASA's GRAIL mission, a pair of probes to measure the moon's gravity field. Five more Delta 2s took off from Vandenberg, a spaceport that can be launched into polar orbit, a perch often used by Earth observation satellites.
There was no other launch on the Delta 2 program when the medium-powered rocket took off from California with the Suomi weather satellite at the Suomi nuclear power plant in October 2011. The Air Force ended its financial support for the 2009 program, leaving NASA to support infrastructure costs to maintain Delta flight 2.
At the time, ULA claimed to have parts for five more unsold Delta 2 rockets, and NASA finally ordered four of them to launch Earth observation and meteorological spacecraft from Vandenberg Air Force Base. :
- July 2, 2014: Observatory of carbon in orbit 2
- January 31, 2015: Active passive soil moisture
- Nov 18, 2017: Common Polar Satellite System 1
- September 15, 2018: ICESat 2
The fifth Delta 2 rocket in the ULA's inventory never flew. Instead, it will be displayed at KSC Visitor Complex, a destination for more than 1.5 million visitors each year.
"The Visitor Complex will help us keep the story of the success of this much revered rocket in the hearts and minds of the public," said Bruno.
The Delta 2, with its blue colors, will join the Juno 1, Juno 2, Mercury-Redstone, Mercury-Atlas, Atlas-Agena, Thor-Delta and Gemini-Titan 2 vehicles in the Rocket Garden. A Saturn 1B rocket is displayed near its side.
The Delta 2 will become the second largest rocket exposed in the Rocket Garden, overtaken only by the Saturn 1B.
"We will be able to show this blue beauty to everyone, and they can have the opportunity to experience the legacy of Delta 2, the legacy of reliability … and how much Delta 2 really played a role in the US government and the lives of people with all the science missions, trade missions and GPS satellites that have changed the way we work, "said Mic Woltman, NASA's Launch Services Vehicle Systems Engineer at Kennedy Space Center.
"The Delta 2 will live among these giants," said Jennifer Mayo, director of exhibitions and artifacts at KSC's visitor complex. "We will take care of this precious treasure for generations to come."
Bruno added on Twitter that the Delta 2 screen would consist of "essentially flightable" material.
New rocket company to take control of Vandenberg's Delta 2 platform
Once the launch crews have cleaned and secured the Delta 2 pad in Vandenberg – named Space Launch Complex 2-West – the equipment will be turned over to a new tenant.
Firefly Aerospace, a Texan company developing a family of small commercial launchers, announced earlier this year its intention to base its first rocket flights from SLC-2W to Vandenberg. 30 Wing Air Force issued a "statement of support" for Firefly to launch its Alpha and Beta rockets from the platform overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
Tim Dunn, director of NASA's ICESat 2 mission launch, said he hoped for a quick transition from SLC-2W to a new launch operator.
"When the Air Force launched the GPS (on Delta 2) in 2009, they completed the program and gave us responsibility for the Delta 2 program," Dunn said in a recent interview. "So we have to close the program. That means that at the hardware level, we have to … find new homes or find an appropriate way to have all the equipment, mainly ground support equipment (and) manufacturing equipment.
"What you do is try to find new users, transfer it to the new user or find a way to remove it, at the lowest possible cost," Dunn said. "It's all the associated mechanical and electrical ground support equipment. You then have the property, so there will be a process at SLC-2 to basically evaluate the impact of the Delta program over the years at SLC-2 and then reach an agreement with the prospective owner / operator, or at least with the real estate owner, who is the Air Force.
"We secure it, secure it and, in case of contamination, we remove it from the property and we configure it."
There remains some "uncertainty" about the amount of Delta 2-SLC-2W support structures and equipment that will be used by future rockets that will take off from the launch pad. The installation includes a mobile gantry, cranes, a fixed umbilical tower and propellant tanks.
"There are other people who are trying to get SLC-2, so we are working with NASA and this company, and others who might be interested, to see exactly what the activities are. closing, "said Scott Messer, ULA Delta Program Manager 2, without identifying the names of companies interested in the launch area.
"The new company may be shipping and retaining much of the equipment provided by the government, and perhaps even ULA equipment if they find it useful," Messer told Spaceflight Now. "It's a bit indeterminate for the moment.
"At the moment, NASA has no scope or contractual direction to eliminate everything. If the new tenant retains most of this amount, there may be no provision, "he said.
More than 70 Thor and Delta rockets have taken off from the SLC-2W launch pad for more than 50 years, including 45 Delta 2 missions since 1995.
The Air Force demolished the towers of the Delta 2 launch pads at Cape Canaveral in July. Moon Express plans to develop a plant and test site on the property for its commercial lunar landing program.
Messer said the ULA team that prepared the final launch of Delta 2 will continue to work on the company's Atlas 5 and Delta 4 rockets. The Delta 2 production line was closed more than 10 years ago and the ULA launch team was formed in the Atlas and Delta families.
"They will just continue to launch the existing product line," said Messer.
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Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @ StephenClark1.
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