The carrier, the first stage of which is equipped with a Russian RD-180 engine, launched from the Cape Canaveral cosmodrome
NEW YORK, December 7. /tass/. The American company United Launch Alliance (ULA) launched an Atlas V launch vehicle with two satellites on Tuesday by order of the Space Forces of the US Armed Forces. The broadcast is conducted on the ULA website.
The carrier, the first stage of which is equipped with a Russian RD-180 engine developed by NPO Energomash (part of Roscosmos), launched from the Cape Canaveral cosmodrome (Florida) at 05:22 East Coast time (13:22 Moscow Time). Initially scheduled for December 5, the launch was postponed due to a leak in the fuel storage system.
The STPSat-6 and LDPE-1 satellites were created by Northrop Grumman Corporation, one of the Pentagon's leading contractors. As previously reported by the press service of ULA, both devices are supposed to be put into geostationary orbit. STPSat-6 is equipped, in particular, with equipment designed to track nuclear explosions on the Earth's surface or in underground tunnels. The information will be sent to the Pentagon and the National Nuclear Safety Administration under the US Department of Energy.
STPSat-6 also houses NASA's experimental communications equipment, which converts electrical signals into modulated laser radiation in the infrared range. It is expected that this system will be able to receive and transmit data at a speed of 1.2 gigabits per second. NASA intends to use laser-linked satellites as repeaters for various space missions in the future.
With the help of LDPE-1, it is planned to test a number of technological developments, including on the propulsion system.
