KSC-05-S-00083

From the NASA Mission Director's Center with Vandenberg Air Force Base, this is Pegasus launch control at T-1 hour, 24 minutes and counting. We are on schedule for a 10:25 a.m. Pacific time deployment of the Pegasus rocket from the L-1011 aircraft. Launch countdown procedure is four hours, 25 minutes in duration, and began at 6 a.m. Pacific time this morning. At this time, the Orbital Sciences L-1011 carrier aircraft is at the end of the 10,000-foot runway here at Vandenberg Air Force Base, awaiting a go for departure, which is scheduled to occur at 9:28 a.m. The L-1011 will climb to an altitude of 39,000 feet to a point 100 miles west-northwest of Vandenberg Air Force Base off the coast of Monterey, California, where the deployment of the Pegasus XL rocket will occur. The flight time to that position after takeoff is approximately 58 minutes. Once the Pegasus is dropped from the belly of the L-1011, the Pegasus will ignite five seconds later and proceed downrange on a southerly ascent of 190 degrees.