A SpaceX rocket launched on Wednesday morning carrying two spacecraft for NASA and one for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The two NASA missions are the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe, or IMAP, and the Carruthers Geocorona Observatory. The NOAA mission is known as the Space Weather Follow On-Lagrange 1, or SWFO-L1.
The missions will all study the solar wind — a stream of charged particles from the sun — and its effects on Earth and interstellar space. The flow of electrical charge creates the heliosphere, a giant magnetic bubble that surrounds the solar system and protects us from powerful and dangerous cosmic rays that crisscross the universe.
The NOAA spacecraft will provide crucial warnings when the sun belches a fusillade of high-energy particles at Earth. Such solar storms can disable satellites in orbit and crash electrical power networks on the ground.
The Falcon 9 rocket launched at 7:30 a.m. from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, shortly after sunrise. The three spacecraft will begin to separate from the rocket’s second stage in about 80 minutes.
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