NASA suborbital sounding rocket payload successfully launched

A NASA suborbital sounding rocket carrying multiple student experiments was successfully launched at 5:30 a.m. EDT, Thursday, June 22, from the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The mission carried experiments built by undergraduate students from universities and community colleges across the country through the RockOn! and RockSat-C programs.

The experiments, launch on a 36-foot long Terrier-Improved Orion sounding rocket, flew to an altitude of 72 miles and landed, via parachute, in the Atlantic Ocean. The payload has been recovered and the students are expected to receive their experiments this afternoon to begin their data analysis.

RockOn! and RockSat-C are part of Rocket Week at Wallops. Nearly 130 students and instructors participated in the two programs this week conducted in partnership with the Colorado and Virginia Space Grant Consortia.

Credit: NASA