Project Description
Fleming Technologies has worked with Space@VT on several large projects, including work on this NASA sounding rocket campaign campaign at the Poker Flat Research Range in Alaska (January through March 2017). Fleming Tech was responsible for the systems support for the science experiment section of the payload.
This NASA sounding rocket campaign supported the effort to better understand the space that surrounds Earth—a key situational awareness needed as humans seek to explore beyond our home planet.
Scott Bailey of Virginia Tech, the principal investigator of one of the missions said, “The aurora creates nitric oxide, but in the polar night there is no significant process for destroying the nitric oxide. We believe it builds up to large concentrations. The purpose of our rocket is to measure the abundance and altitude of peak abundance for the nitric oxide.” The rocket launched successfully on January 28th.
(Actual firing around 38 minutes into the clip)