Eight NASA Satellites will Launch Tomorrow!

On December 12, 2016, NASA will attempt to launch eight small satellites to space on board a Pegasus XL rocket, manufactured by the private spaceflight factory Orbital ATK. These satellites are called the CYGNSS mission and the probes are meant to study various aspects of tropical storms and hurricanes from orbit. The goal of this mission is to help scientists understand how these cyclones are formed. The size and cheap cost of these satellites make them more efficient than traditional satellite and weather tracking information that can get damaged by the storms. 

The CYGNSS will study the ocean surface winds within the inner cores of the hurricane. This mission will be able to use these satellites in order to see through the parts of the hurricane where its raining by receiving reflective signals from GPS satellites. The inner cores of the hurricanes are important indicators of how intense a storm can get and the small satellites will make efficient use of mapping how powerful these storms are. 

The mission will get underway tomorrow at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, FL and then the Orbital's Starglazer L-1011 aircraft will carry the rocket carrying the eight small satellites over the Atlantic Ocean. According to the Verge, Tomorrow’s mission gets underway at 7:11AM ET, when Orbital’s Stargazer airplane taxis onto the runway before taking off at 7:26AM ET. The launch window for the Pegasus rocket then opens about an hour later at 8:19AM ET, with release of the vehicle slated for 8:24AM ET. Up until now, weather hasn’t looked too great for the mission. There was a 40 percent chance of favorable conditions, thanks to a cold front that just moved through southern Florida.