Rocket launch

Abstract: From 19 November to 19 December 2010 the fourth and final ECOMA rocket campaign was conducted at Andoya Rocket Range (69° N, 16° E) in northern Norway We present and discuss measurement results obtained during the last rocket launch labelled ECOMA09 when simultaneous and true common volume in situ measurements of temperature and turbulence supported by ground-based lidar observations reveal two Mesospheric Inversion Layers (MIL) at heights between 71 and 73 km and between 86 and 89 km Strong turbulence was measured in the region of the upper inversion layer, with the turbulent energy dissipation rates maximising at 2 W kg−1 This upper MIL was observed by the ALOMAR Weber Na lidar over the period of several hours The spatial extension of this MIL as observed by the MLS instrument onboard AURA satellite was found to be more than two thousand kilometres Our analysis suggests that both observed MILs could possibly have been produced by neutral air turbulence

Abstract: A rocket launch vehicle comprising a rocket body having a forward section and an aft section, a first rocket engine fixedly mounted to the aft section of the rocket body and axially aligned with the rocket body, a second rocket engine detachably mounted to the aft section of the rocket body and aligned axially parallel with the first rocket engine, a third rocket engine detachably mounted to the aft section of the rocket body and aligned axially parallel with the first rocket engine and being on the side of the first rocket engine opposite the second rocket engine, a first recovery structure fastened to the second rocket engine, a second recovery structure attached to the third rocket engine, and a plurality of propellant supply tanks connected to the first, second, and third rocket engines. Each of the rocket engines is a Space Shuttle main engine. The propellant tanks are detachably mounted to the exterior of the rocket body. Fuel tanks are affixed to the interior of the aft section of the rocket body and communicate with the first rocket engine. The recovery structure includes a parachute deployment arrangement for selective deployment of a parachute within a reentry vehicle fixedly attached to each of the second and third rocket engines. The forward section of the rocket body is a modified Titan 4 payload fairing.

Abstract: The most promising alternative to rockets for improved access to space involves staged systems using airbreathing propulsion. With scramjet technology improving, a number of airbreathing assisted access-to-space vehicle concepts have recently been proposed, including a three-stage rocket-scramjet-rocket launch architecture for payload masses on the order of 100 kg. This article presents a design methodology developed for the airbreathing second stage of such a system. This methodology uses multidisciplinary design optimization with simplified methods for the calculation of vehicle aerodynamics, propulsion, and mass. It has been applied to the design of a reusable scramjet-powered winged cone vehicle with a near-term Mach 6–12 hydrogen-fueled scramjet for propulsion. Through the manipulation of five vehicle design parameters, including the size and position of the engines, and flying the vehicle along constant dynamic pressure trajectories, a configuration was developed to maximize payload mass fraction to...

Abstract: In this study, we analyzed signals transmitted by the U.S. Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) geostationary (GEO) satellites using the Variometric Approach for Real-Time Ionosphere Observation (VARION) algorithm in a simulated real-time scenario, to characterize the ionospheric response to the 24 August 2017 Falcon 9 rocket launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. VARION is a real-time Global Navigation Satellites Systems (GNSS)-based algorithm that can be used to detect various ionospheric disturbances associated with natural hazards, such as tsunamis and earthquakes. A noise reduction algorithm was applied to the VARION-GEO solutions to remove the satellite-dependent noise term. Our analysis showed that the interactions of the exhaust plume with the ionospheric plasma depleted the total electron content (TEC) to a level comparable with nighttime TEC values. During this event, the geometry of the satellite-receiver link is such that GEO satellites measured the depleted plasma hole before any GPS satellites. We estimated that the ionosphere relaxed back to a pre-perturbed state after about 3 h, and the hole propagated with a mean speed of about 600 m/s over a region of 700 km in radius. We conclude that the VARION-GEO approach can provide important ionospheric TEC real-time measurements, which are not affected by the motion of the ionospheric pierce points (IPPs). Furthermore, the VARION-GEO measurements experience a steady noise level throughout the entire observation period, making this technique particularly useful to augment and enhance the capabilities of well-established GNSS-based ionosphere remote sensing techniques and future ionospheric-based early warning systems.