Clinton-era Deep Space Climate Observatory Ships to Florida Launch Site, Finally

摘要

After spending more than a decade in storage, the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) - a Clinton-era satellite formerly known as Triana - arrived in Florida Nov. 20 for integration with the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket set to launch it Jan. 23, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said in a press release. DSCOVR uses hardware initially assembled for an Earth observation satellite conceived in the 1990s by then-U.S. Vice President Al Gore, earning the spacecraft the nickname Goresat. Resurrected by the Obama administration after the administration of President George W. Bush shelved the project in 2001, DSCOVR has been recast as a space weather mission and will head to Earth-sun Lagrange point 1 to keep an eye on charged particles blasting out of the sun.