Genesis Launch Postponed Due To Technical Glitch

SPACE SCIENCE

In one of the most unique missions planned by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration in recent years, Genesis is to travel 1.5-million-kilometers (930,000-miles) then spend three years "sun-bathing" and try to collect as much as 20 micrograms of solar wind, about the weight of a few grains of salt.

Washington (AFP) July 30 2001
The much-awaited launch of the robotic space explorer Genesis, designed to capture wisps of solar wind, has been postponed for 48 hours due to a technical glitch, NASA announced Monday.

Genesis was to be blasted into space from Florida's Kennedy Space Center aboard a Boeing Delta II rocket.

NASA engineers postponed the take-off on worries about the explorer's star tracker navigation equipment.

Initially, the launch was postponed by 24 hours. But later, mission managers added another day to give technicians more time.

If all goes well, a new launch attempt will take place Wednesday at 12:32 pm local time (1632 GMT), with a two-minute window of opportunity.

If that fails, NASA has until August 14 to launch the explorer. After that, ideal weather conditions are only expected to return in December.

Then in 2004, 32 million kilometers (20 million miles) later, the robot, carefully toting its solar cargo, will re-enter the Earth's atmosphere in a dramatic helicopter rescue.

As the Genesis capsule parachutes down, specially trained helicopter pilots will catch it James Bond style -- on the fly, to prevent the delicate samples from being disturbed by the impact of a parachute landing.

The smidgens of the sun then will be preserved in a special laboratory where scientists hope the 209-million-dollar mission and its delicate results will provide clues to the fundamental questions about the exact composition of the sun and the birth of the solar system.

SPACE SCIENCE

Genesis To Catch Some Solar Rays

Pasadena July 16, 2001
NASA'S next robotic space explorer is ready to do a little sunbathing on a mission to catch a wisp of raw material from the luminous celestial body around which the Earth and other planets revolve.

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