Sounding Rocket Flights
The first sounding rocket flights for X-ray research were accomplished at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico with a V-2 rocket on January 28, 1949. A detector was placed in the nose cone section and the rocket was launched in a suborbital flight to an altitude just above the atmosphere.
X-rays from the Sun were detected by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory Blossom experiment on board. An Aerobee 150 rocket was launched on June 12, 1962 and it detected the first X-rays from other celestial sources (Scorpius X-1).
The largest drawback to rocket flights is their very short duration (just a few minutes above the atmosphere before the rocket falls back to Earth) and their limited field of view. A rocket launched from the United States will not be able to see sources in the southern sky; a rocket launched from Australia will not be able to see sources in the northern sky.
Read more about this topic: X-ray Astronomy
Famous quotes containing the words sounding, rocket and/or flights:
“Mathematics: silent harmonies. Music: sounding numbers.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“A rocket is an experiment; a star is an observation.”
—José Bergamín (1895–1983)
“Franklin said once in one of his inspired flights of malignity—
Early to bed and early to rise
Make a man healthy and wealth and wise.
As if it were any object to a boy to be healthy and wealthy and wise on such terms.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)