A sounding rocket, sometimes called a research rocket, is an instrument-carrying rocket designed to take measurements and perform scientific experiments during its sub-orbital flight. The origin of the term comes from nautical vocabulary, where to sound is to throw a weighted line from a ship into the water to gauge the water's depth. Sounding in the rocket context is equivalent to taking a measurement.
The rockets are used to carry instruments from 50 to 1,500 kilometres (31 to 930 mi) above the surface of the Earth, the altitude generally between weather balloons and satellites (the maximum altitude for balloons is about 40 kilometres (25 mi) and the minimum for satellites is approximately 120 kilometres (75 mi)). Certain sounding rockets, such as the Black Brant X and XII, have an apogee between 1,000 and 1,500 kilometres (620 and 930 mi); the maximum apogee of their class. Sounding rockets often use military surplus rocket motors. NASA routinely flies the Terrier Mk 70 boosted Improved Orion lifting 270–450 kilograms (600–990 lb) payloads into the exoatmospheric region between 100 and 200 kilometres (62 and 120 mi).
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Famous quotes containing the words sounding and/or rocket:
“It struck me that the movies had spent more than half a century saying, They lived happily ever after and the following quarter-century warning that theyll be lucky to make it through the weekend. Possibly now we are now entering a third era in which the movies will be sounding a note of cautious optimism: You know it just might work.”
—Nora Ephron (b. 1941)
“A rocket is an experiment; a star is an observation.”
—José Bergamín (18951983)