by Amy Hartley, Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska Fairbanks
01 Feb 2013
Staff and scientists at Poker Flat Research Range are busy preparing for the opening of the 2013 launch window that will allow one NASA sounding rocket to take MILENA 2013 flight and arc through an active aurora display over northern Alaska. The launch window is scheduled to span Feb. 2 to 17, 2013. The rocket experiment is named VISIONS, short for “VISualizing Ion Outflow via Neutral atom imaging during a Substorm.”
Following up on a NASA promise to recover spent rocket parts scattered for decades across northern Alaska, workers for Poker Flat Research Range recovered more than 7,000 pounds of debris from 17 different sites in 2012.
On Saturday, Feb. 18 at 8:41 p.m. Alaska time, scientists launched a NASA sounding rocket from Poker Flat Research Range into a brilliant aurora display. The rocket mission, designed to gather information on space weather conditions that affect satellite communications, was a success.
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