{"id":615,"date":"2006-09-25T00:55:00","date_gmt":"2006-09-25T06:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2006\/09\/officials-optimistic-about-first-rocket-launch\/"},"modified":"2006-09-25T00:55:00","modified_gmt":"2006-09-25T06:55:00","slug":"officials-optimistic-about-first-rocket-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2006\/09\/officials-optimistic-about-first-rocket-launch\/","title":{"rendered":"Officials optimistic about first rocket launch"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>A group of about 200 people gathered Sunday evening at the Hilton Las Cruces for a briefing that revealed the historic nature of today\u2019s planned first launch from Spaceport America<\/st1:country-region> northeast of Las Cruces<\/st1:place><\/st1:city>. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

One of the experiments going into space, which will measure the effect of time on watches, was designed by a group of middle- and high-school students, including sixth graders from St. Paul<\/st1:city>, Minn.<\/st1:state><\/st1:place> who were in attendance at the briefing. Payloads on the rocket will travel into space in containers designed and manufactured by high-school students.<\/p>\n

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<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u201cIt\u2019s just great working with some of our best and brightest youngsters,\u201d said Eric Knight<\/a>, CEO of UP Aerospace<\/a>. \u201cReally, that\u2019s at the core of our company \u2013 education.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

At 7:30 a.m., UP Aerospace is scheduled to launch a SpaceLoft<\/a> rocket into space and back. The 20-foot-long rocket\u2019s flight will be less than 15 minutes, and it will land on White<\/st1:placename> Sands<\/st1:placename> Missile<\/st1:placename> Range<\/st1:placetype><\/st1:place>.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The rocket is 10 inches in diameter and has a payload capacity of 110 pounds.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The weather looks good for the launch, and everything else is running smoothly, Knight said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cEverything has come together wonderfully,\u201d he said. \u201cAll systems are testing well.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The rocket will carry experiments from New Mexico<\/st1:placename> State<\/st1:placetype> University<\/st1:placetype>, NASA\u2019s Colorado Space Grant, the Connecticut<\/st1:placename> Center<\/st1:placetype> for Advanced Technology (CCAT), Brown<\/st1:placename> University<\/st1:placetype> and Central<\/st1:placename> Connecticut<\/st1:placename> State<\/st1:placetype> University<\/st1:placetype><\/st1:place>. Officials from those organizations spoke about their experiments Sunday night.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The grade-school students work with CCAT. Knight said his company was struggling with how to store payloads on the rockets when the high-school students, unsolicited, came up with the containers that will be used in this and future flights.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cWe were struggling with how to maximize the space,\u201d Knight said. \u201cThey showed us this metal prototype, and it was brilliant.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The containers are shaped like pie slivers so that, when pieced together, they fit well into the tube-shaped body of the rocket.<\/p>\n

If all goes well with today\u2019s planned launch, space will be more affordable and accessible to all.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

William Heiden, CFO for UP Aerospace, said the company aims to prove \u201cthat space commercialization can happen.\u201d The company\u2019s Web site touts that it reduces the cost of sending payloads into space by up to 95 percent when compared with other methods \u2013 from hundreds of thousands of dollars to thousands of dollars.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Heiden said the company doesn\u2019t plan to send humans into space in the future.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d like, maybe someday, to be the UPS of space, to bring things to space stations, maybe the moon and Mars,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In the meantime, company officials are focused on ensuring that everything goes well today. I\u2019ll be out at the spaceport for the launch and will have complete coverage later today including, if all goes well, video of the launch. Check back later.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

I may also update my blog from the launch site using my cell phone. If I do that, a gray box with the words \u201cplay this audio post\u201d will appear above this posting. Click on that box to listen to the update.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In the meantime, click here<\/a> to view video footage of the launch site from KRQE in Albuquerque<\/st1:place><\/st1:city>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A group of about 200 people gathered Sunday evening at the Hilton Las Cruces for a briefing that revealed the historic nature of today\u2019s planned first launch from Spaceport America northeast of Las Cruces. One of the experiments going into space, which will measure the effect of time on watches, was designed by a group […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}