Photo Gallery: GRAIL configured for moon flight


BY STEPHEN CLARK
SPACEFLIGHT NOW

Posted: August 11, 2011


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NASA's twin Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory satellites are in launch configuration, ready to move to the pad and meet a Delta 2 rocket for liftoff toward the moon.

The GRAIL satellites will launch as soon as Sept. 8 on a nearly four-month journey to the moon's orbit, where the probes will measure the lunar gravity field and study the moon's interior. The spacecraft will track the distance between themselves to detect minute changes in the moon's gravity as they orbit 30 miles above the surface.

After arriving from Lockheed Martin's factory in Denver in May, the satellites were configured for launch, filled with propellant, and tested before being placed on an adapter inside a pristine clean room just outside the Kennedy Space Center.

The satellites will be transported Complex 17B at Cape Canaveral on Aug. 16, where they will join a Delta 2 rocket already assembled on the pad.

These photos show the twin satellites Thursday during a media photo opportunity.

Photo credit: Stephen Clark/Spaceflight Now

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