🌎 Envi Impact Studies

Space to Ground: Watching the Earth Breathe: 05/17/2019

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climate.nasa.gov

[Catalog Image]

Carbon Monoxide Transport from California Wildfires, July 30-August 7, 2018

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CONTRACT RELEASEΒ C21-003
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NASA Awards Launch ServiceΒ 

Contract for TROPICS MissionΒ 

to Study Storm Processes

NASA has selected Astra Space Inc. to provide a launch service for the agency’s Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation Structure and Storm Intensity with a Constellation of SmallSats (TROPICS) mission. TheΒ TROPICS missionΒ consists of a constellation of sixΒ CubeSats and will increase the scientific community’s understanding of storm processes.

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The launch service contract for the TROPICS mission is a firm fixed-price contract valued at $7.95 million. NASA’s Launch Services Program at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida will manage the launch service.

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The CubeSats, each the size of a shoebox, will provide rapid-refresh microwave measurements that can be used to determine temperature, pressure, and humidity inside hurricanes as they form and evolve. The TROPICS mission’s high-revisit imaging and sounding observations are enabled by microwave technology developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Lincoln Laboratory. These observations will profoundly improve scientists’ understanding of processes driving high-impact storms.

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Astra Space will launch the CubeSats on the company’s Rocket 3 from Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands with three separate launches over a 120-day period. The TROPICS mission is targeted for launch between Jan. 8 and July 31, 2022, under a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) launch license.

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