Inside the Astrotech payload processing facility in Titusville, Fla., NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite, or TDRS-L, spacecraft has been encapsulated in its payload fairing. It is being lifted by crane for mounting on a transporter for its trip to Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The TDRS-L satellite will be a part of the second of three next-generation spacecraft designed to ensure vital operational continuity for the NASA Space Network. TDRS-L is scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 41 atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at 9:05 p.m. EST on Jan. 23, 2014, the start of a 30-minute launch window.
\nThe current Tracking and Data Relay Satellite system consists of eight in-orbit satellites distributed to provide near continuous information relay contact with orbiting spacecraft ranging from the International Space Station and Hubble Space Telescope to the array of scientific observatories.
\n> Read more
\nImage Credit: NASA\/Kim Shiflett<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Inside the Astrotech payload processing facility in Titusville, Fla., NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite, or TDRS-L, spacecraft has been encapsulated in its payload fairing. It is being lifted by crane for mounting on a transporter for its trip to Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The TDRS-L satellite will be a part of the second of three next-generation spacecraft designed to ensure vital operational continuity for the NASA Space Network. TDRS-L is scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 41 atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at 9:05 p.m. EST on Jan. 23, 2014, the start of a 30-minute launch window.
\nThe current Tracking and Data Relay Satellite system consists of eight in-orbit satellites distributed to provide near continuous information relay contact with orbiting spacecraft ranging from the International Space Station and Hubble Space Telescope to the array of scientific observatories.
\n> Read more
\nImage Credit: NASA\/Kim Shiflett<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":612598,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-218733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nasa-i-o-d"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=218733"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218733\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":218740,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218733\/revisions\/218740"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/612598"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=218733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=218733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=218733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}