Apparently the stacking of the Atlas V for this launch is already underway for launch on April 3: http://www.spaceflightnow.com/atlas/nrol67/stacking.htmlWith quite a bit of excess capacity on this flight, is ULA planning yet another Centaur new feature demonstration like they did on DMSP-F18 in October 2009?
Except for historical organizational reasons, are there any reason that NOAA and USAF both keep a separate system of polar weather satellites? I know that DMSP is more inclined for military planning, but are there any operational or instrumentation differences that would argue for TWO separate systems?
Quote from: Galactic Penguin SST on 03/28/2014 03:14 pmExcept for historical organizational reasons, are there any reason that NOAA and USAF both keep a separate system of polar weather satellites? I know that DMSP is more inclined for military planning, but are there any operational or instrumentation differences that would argue for TWO separate systems? NOAA is concerned with the US weather and its passes are timed with daylight as such, DMSP is more concerned with the rest of the world.
Another excellent launch preview by William Graham:http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2014/04/atlas-v-usafs-dmsp-5d3-f-19-satellite/Includes a few paras I included at the end about the two Cape launches. I've linked on both relevant threads, so any discussion relating to those should be on those threads.
Quote from: Jim on 03/28/2014 03:30 pmQuote from: Galactic Penguin SST on 03/28/2014 03:14 pmExcept for historical organizational reasons, are there any reason that NOAA and USAF both keep a separate system of polar weather satellites? I know that DMSP is more inclined for military planning, but are there any operational or instrumentation differences that would argue for TWO separate systems? NOAA is concerned with the US weather and its passes are timed with daylight as such, DMSP is more concerned with the rest of the world.As DMSP is in a sun synchronous orbit, it takes it readings at the same solar time all over the world. Lighting conditions are the same for the US as anywhere else. Why would the orbit be adjusted differently for the DoD requirements?My impression is that there were other reasons why the Integrated Program Office would not produce a weather system to the satisfaction of all three "cooperating" organizations, NASA, NOAA, and DoD. I saw some of this first hand working on NPOESS in the 1990's.