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LAUNCH & DATA ANALYSIS

Orbital Sciences Corporation provides the spacecraft bus and will provide observatory Integration and Testing at its Dulles Facility. The AIM observatory will be shipped to the Vandenberg Air Force Base and integrated as the primary payload aboard a Pegasus XL launch vehicle.

An Orbital plane carries the Pegasus launch vehicle at take-off.
An Orbital airplane carries the Pegasus launch vehicle.

Pending availability of the required spectrum licenses, AIM plans to use the Honeywell Datalynx PF1 11-m antenna at Poker Flat Alaska and the Kongsberg 11-m SKS antenna in Svalbard, Norway for space-to-ground communications. Wallops will be baselined for contingency operations, using the 11-m and 9-m systems. Mission operations will be performed by CU/LASP. AIM data will be analyzed and prepared for public archiving by Hampton University with the assistance of GATS Inc. The data archive itself will be provided by the NSSDC and made available to the public through the Internet.

More @ NASA

National Space Science Data Center (NSSDC) web site:
More information about the NSSDC at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland
> http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

NASA Facts
> AIM Fact Sheet


More on the Net

Vandenberg Air Force Base's web site:
> http://www.vandenberg.
af.mil

Poker Flat Data Lynx Project:
More information about the Honeywell Datalynx PF1 11-m antenna in Poker Flat, Alaska
> http://www.uaf.edu/pps/
datalynx/datalynx.html

Kongsberg Satellite Services web site:
More information about the Kongsberg 11-m SKS antenna in Svalbard, Norway
> http://www.ksat.no

 
NASA's Sun-Earth Education Forum Logo

The AIM mission is a part of
NASA's Sun-Earth Connection Education Forum.

Responsible Official: James M. Russell III

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