TESS Launch Close Up
Image Credit &
Copyright:
John Kraus
NASA's
Transiting Exoplanet Survey
Satellite (TESS) began its search for planets orbiting other stars by
leaving planet Earth on April 18.
The exoplanet hunter
rode
to orbit on top of a Falcon 9 rocket.
The Falcon 9 is so
designated for its 9 Merlin first stage engines
seen in this sound-activated camera close-up
from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
In the coming weeks, TESS will use a series of thruster burns
to boost it into a high-Earth, highly elliptical orbit.
A lunar gravity assist maneuver will allow it to reach a previously
untried stable orbit with half the orbital period of the Moon and a
maximum distance from Earth of about 373,000 kilometers (232,000 miles).
From there, TESS
will carry out a two year survey to search for
planets around the brightest and closest stars in the sky.