Tag: Orbital ATK
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Minotaur rocket selected to launch military satellite in 2017
File photo of an Orbital ATK Minotaur 4 rocket on a launch pad at Kodiak Island, Alaska. Credit: Stephen Clark/Spaceflight Now Cape Canaveral will get its first Minotaur rocket launch in 2017, when the solid-fueled booster will send up a U.S. Air Force space surveillance satellite under a contract with Orbital ATK. An upgraded Minotaur…
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Orbital ATK picks up where it left off with Orion abort system
NASA’s Orion spacecraft, seen with a mostly inert launch abort system, is transferred to the launch pad before last December’s test flight. Credit: NASA/Frankie Martin Orbital ATK has cinched $188 million in contracts to complete development of the Orion crew capsule’s needle-shaped launch abort system, resuming work stalled in the wake up a major shakeup…
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Ariane 5 ready to pull double duty for DirecTV
The Ariane 5 rocket loaded with DirecTV and Sky Mexico 1 rolled to the launch pad in French Guiana on Tuesday. Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – S. Martin Two satellites equipped to broadcast television programming to millions of homes across the United States and Latin America are braced for launch from French…
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Decision on new space station cargo contracts deferred
SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft arrives at the International Space Station on April 17 for its sixth operational cargo delivery. Credit: ESA/NASA NASA expects to select commercial contractors to resupply the International Space Station in September, three months later than the agency’s previous timetable under a competition for cargo deliveries beginning in 2018. NASA was scheduled to…
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Photo: New Orbital ATK paint job for Pegasus carrier jet
Credit: Orbital ATK The aircraft that air-launches the Pegasus rocket has been repainted with new livery to mark the recent corporate merge that formed Orbital ATK. The L-1011 jet, named Stargazer, carries the light-class Pegasus launchers to an altitude of 39,000 feet and releases the booster to fire into space. Pegasus has flown 42 times…
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Powerful solid rocket motor fired in Utah
A five-segment solid rocket booster fires in Utah on Wednesday. Credit: Orbital ATK A solid-fueled rocket booster fired for more than two minutes in Utah on Wednesday, spewing a torrent of glowing hot flame against a hillside in a key test for the Space Launch System, a behemoth rocket NASA is developing to send astronauts…
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Stationary rocket to be test-fired in Utah for NASA
Coverage begins at 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT). The largest solid rocket booster in the world, an extended version of the space shuttle motor, will be test-fired in Utah on Wednesday to check its qualifications to be part of NASA’s new heavy-lift Space Launch System. Comprised mostly of legacy space shuttle parts, including a piece…
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NASA orders missions to resupply space station in 2017
A SpaceX Dragon spacecraft approaches the International Space Station in September 2014. Credit: NASA NASA has ordered four additional launches to deliver cargo to the International Space Station in 2017 — three from SpaceX and one from Orbital ATK — to cover the research lab’s logistics needs until a new set of resupply contracts take…
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SES bridges the Atlantic in latest satellite purchase
Artist’s concept of the SES 16/GovSat satellite to be manufactured by Orbital ATK. Credit: Orbital ATK Boeing Satellite Systems, Airbus Defense and Space and Orbital ATK have won orders from Luxembourg-based satellite operator SES for three new communications spacecraft for launch in 2017. SES announced the deals with three satellite manufacturers Monday for spacecraft to…