Mesquito

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Mesquito
The Mesquito sounding rocket
Fact sheet
Function	Sounding rocket
Manufacturer	NSROC
Country of origin	United States
Launch History
Status	Active
Launch sites	LC-2, Wallops Island
Total launches	2
Successes	1
Failures	1
Maiden flight	6 May 2008

The Mesquito is a new sounding rocket vehicle developed for the NASA Sounding Rocket Program on Wallops Island, Virgina. The "skeeter" was developed to provide rocket borne measurements of the mesospheric region of the upper atmosphere. An area of great science interest is in the 82 - 95 km region where the conventional understanding of atmospherics physics is being challenged.

The skeeter is a two stage sounding rocket using a 9 inch diameter solid propellant rocket motor as the 1st stage propulsion device. The non-propulsive 2nd stage dart contains a free flying structural body that includes an avionics suite and an experiment space with interface.

NASA Sounding Rocket Operations Contract (NSROC) engineers and technicians are the developers and designers of the sounding rocket. The maiden flight occurred on 6 May 2008, from LC-2 at the Wallops Flight Facility.

[edit] Launch history

Date	Time (GMT)	S/N	Mission	Outcome	Remarks
2008-05-06	18:00-20:00	12.065	Test	Success	Maiden flight[1]
2008-05-07	18:00-20:00	12.066	Test	Failure	Loss of control following burnout[1]

[edit] References

Sounding Rocket Technology Development. NASA.

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