The Magnetospheric Multiscale spacecraft, enclosed in a protective shipping container, are delivered by truck to the Astrotech payload processing facility in Titusville, Florida, near Kennedy Space Center. MMS is a Solar Terrestrial Probes mission comprising four identically instrumented spacecraft that will use Earth’s magnetosphere as a laboratory to study the microphysics of three fundamental plasma processes: magnetic reconnection, energetic particle acceleration and turbulence. Launch aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station is targeted for March 12, 2015.
Location Astrotech, Titusville, FL
Date October 29, 2014