CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The last in NASA's series of "Great Observatory" telescopes for exploring the universe is packed and ready to be launched atop a Boeing Delta 2 rocket this weekend.
The $1.2 billion Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF) mission is set for launch at 1:35.39 a.m. EDT (0635.39) Monday from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's complex 17.
"It's sitting just a few miles from here, on top of the rocket and ready to go. We're very excited," David Gallagher, SIRTF project manager for NASA at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., told reporters at the Kennedy Space Center on Friday.
There is a last-minute technical concern with some electronic boxes on the Delta 2 rocket's first and second stages, but officials are hopeful they can clear the trouble on Saturday with a review of paperwork and inspections of the hardware.
If all goes well with that review, the only remaining hurdle will be the final countdown and the weather, which is expected to be fairly good for Monday morning's launch opportunity.
Air Force weather officials are predicting an 80 percent chance of acceptable conditions.
A tropical depression to the south of the Dominican Republic was dissipating into a tropical wave late Friday, but even if it regenerates it still will be the middle of the week before it would have a chance to threaten Florida's Space Coast.Among the many reasons why officials are hoping for clear conditions: A pair of rocketcams are aboard the 13-story rocket, one facing down and another pointed up.
The cameras are expected to provide live views for most of the climb to orbit and also at the moment of spacecraft separation, which is expected about 48 minutes after liftoff.
Then it will take about a month or so after launch to fully check out the telescope's science instruments and begin making observations, which are intended to seek out some of the darkest and most ancient objects in the dustiest regions of space.
SIRTF's heat-sensitive equipment will concentrate on learning more about the universe by looking at it through infrared eyes in a level of detail never before accomplished in space.
"When it is launched we will have the capability to observe from space in the optical with the Hubble Space Telescope, in the X-ray with the Chandra X-Ray Observatory and finally in the infrared with SIRTF," said Anne Kinney, division director of astronomy and physics at NASA headquarters in Washington.
Scientists expect SIRTF to provide images that are visually and scientifically as grand as those Hubble has beamed back to Earth for the past decade -- prompting some to dub SIRTF a "son of Hubble."
"The difference is that Hubble just dips its toe into the infrared wavelength band, and SIRTF is right smack in the middle of it," said SIRTF project scientist Michael Werner.
The last Great Observatory's 33.5-inch (85-centimeter) mirror will allow it to peer back to the early universe, at objects that barely emit any heat, and through dusty clouds of interstellar material. As Werner puts it, SIRTF will explore "the old, the cold, and the dirty."
SIRTF will rely on three primary science instruments: an infrared camera, a far infrared camera and an infrared spectrograph.
And for the first time, NASA is launching a science probe into what's called a "trailing Earth orbit." That means that SIRTF will be placed into an orbit around the Sun that matches Earth's orbit, but lags behind the home planet by several million miles.
Officials say this telescope provides simpler operations, allows a greater percentage of time for science observations and takes advantage of the cold of deep space to keep the heat-sensitive instruments super cool.
"It's very fair to say that SIRTF really represents a massive advance in the state of the art for an infrared space telescope," Gallagher said. "SIRTF is a perfect example of what's possible when you have a really highly talented group of people motivated by a common vision to get this observatory up there and generate this great science."
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