KSC-2012-3225

KWAJALEIN ATOLL, Marshall Islands – Orbital Sciences' L-1011 carrier aircraft touches down at the U.S. Army's Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site on Kwajalein Atoll, delivering Orbital’s Pegasus rocket and NASA’s Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The Pegasus, mated to its NuSTAR payload, will be launched from the carrier aircraft 117 nautical miles south of Kwajalein at latitude 6.75 degrees north of the equator. The high-energy X-ray telescope will conduct a census of black holes, map radioactive material in young supernovae remnants, and study the origins of cosmic rays and the extreme physics around collapsed stars. Launch and deployment of the telescope is scheduled for June 13. For more information, visit http:__www.nasa.gov_nustar. Photo courtesy of Orbital Sciences Corp.