
KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. -- Looking like a comet with a tail of smoky exhaust, Boeing's Delta II rocket hurtles into space carrying NASA's Deep Space 1 spacecraft. The first flight in NASA's New Millennium Program, Deep Space 1 is designed to validate 12 new technologies for scientific space missions of the next century, including the ion propulsion engine. Propelled by the gas xenon, the engine is being flight-tested for future deep space and Earth-orbiting missions. Other onboard experiments include software that tracks celestial bodies so the spacecraft can make its own navigation decisions without the intervention of ground controllers. Deep Space 1 will complete most of its mission objectives within the first two months, but will also do a flyby of a near-Earth asteroid, 1992 KD, in July 1999
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98pc1387
Date Created
October 24, 1998
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NASA or National Aeronautics and Space Administration
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