A little while ago, NASA’s ICESat-2 satellite blasted off atop a Delta II 7420-10C rocket from the Vandenberg base. After almost 55 minutes it successfully separated from the rocket’s last stage and entered its almost polar and almost circular orbit at an altitude of 496 kilometers (308 miles), from where it will study glaciers but also the rest of the territory.
A few hours ago the Aeolus satellite was launched on a Vega rocket from the Kourou base in French Guiana. After almost 55 minutes it successfully separated from the rocket’s last stage and entered its Sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 320 kilometers (about 200 miles), from where it will study winds globally.
An article published in the journal “Nature Astronomy” describes unprecedented observations of matter around a black hole. A team of researchers used the data detected using an X-ray polarimeter on board the PoGO+ satellite to obtain information on the part of hard X-rays that are reflected from the accretion disk around the black hole of the Cygnus X-1 system and identify the shape of the matter that composes it.
A few hours ago, the two GRACE-FO twin spacecraft were launched on a Falcon 9 rocket from the Vandenberg base. After about ten minutes they successfully separated from the rocket’s last stage and entered a polar orbit. Shortly thereafter they started transmitting telemetry signals. SpaceX’s mission continued with the launch of 5 satellites of the Iridium constellation.
A few hours ago NASA’s InSight lander was launched together with the two Mars Cube One nanosatellites from the Vandenberg base on an Atlas V 401 rocket. After about 1.5 hours they separated from the rocket’s last stage, called Centaur, and went en route to Mars.
The InSight (Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) mission aims to investigate the geology of the planet Mars. A lander equipped with a seismometer, a thermal sensor and other instruments that will analyze the red planet’s internal structure. This will allow to obtain new data on its formation, also contributing to the existing models on the formation of rocky planets such as the Earth.
