NASA IRIS Solar Satellite: Launch from Vandenberg AFB

Interface Region Imaging Spectograph (IRIS) satellite with solar wings deployed in in Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company in Sunnyvale, Calif.


Workers unload NASA's IRIS spacecraft from a truck at the processing facility at Vandenberg where the spacecraft will be readied for launch aboard an Orbital Sciences Pegasus XL rocket. 

Photo credit: VAFB/Randy Beaudoin

Scientists will soon gain a better view into energy and plasma movement near the surface of the sun, thanks to delivery of the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) spacecraft to Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. in preparation for launch.

Part of NASA's Small Explorer (SMEX) Mission, which delivers space exploration missions costing less than $120 million, IRIS was designed and built at Lockheed Martin's Space Systems Company Advanced Technology Center (ATC) in Palo Alto, Calif.

The launch of IRIS will not take place before May 28.

"The entire IRIS team is enormously pleased that we've reached this crucial milestone," said Gary Kushner, Lockheed Martin IRIS program manager.

"After many months of hard work by the Lockheed Martin team and all of our collaborators and subcontractors in designing, engineering, building and testing the instrument and integrated spacecraft, our goal of putting it into orbit is in sight and we look forward to producing great science at a low cost."

"The IRIS spacecraft and instrument are emblematic of the wide range of capabilities that Lockheed Martin brings to the exploration and utilization of space," said Dr. Kenneth Washington, vice president of the ATC.

"The IRIS solar telescope is the latest in a five decade heritage of sensing payloads which, cumulatively, have operated for over 800 years in space. Moreover, our small satellite capabilities have supported multiple successful missions including IKONOS, Lunar Prospector, IMAGE, and now IRIS."

The goal of the IRIS program is to better understand how energy and plasma move from a lower layer of the sun's surface called the photosphere, through the chromosphere layer and to the outer corona layer.