How NASA's Newest Climate Satellite Got a Quick Fix Glory will
fly in a low-Earth orbit of 438 miles (705 km) altitude, which
is about the distance between Boston and Washington. NASA's
newest Earth-studying satellite, Glory, is ready to launch
tomorrow (Feb. 23), but only after an unusually quick fix by the
firm Honeybee Robotics. The New York-based company was able to
design, test and provide a substitute part for the satellite in
eight weeks. "It was really a remarkable turnaround time for a
component like this," said Greg Rahal, lead mechanical engineer
for Orbital Sciences Corp., which built Glory. Glory is a $424.1
million, 1,160-pound spacecraft (525 kilograms) with instruments
aimed at studying how energy from the sun, as well as
atmospheric particles called aerosols, affect Earth's climate.
The satellite's planned launch from California's Vandenberg Air
Force Base aboard an Orbital Sciences Taurus XL rocket has been
delayed repeatedly, most recently in October 2010 when Orbital
Sciences discovered a