William Atkins
Friday, 06 March 2009 23:13
Science -
Space
Page 1 of 3
The Kepler spacecraft and its Delta II rocket are ready to lift off from Launch Complex 17-B at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Scheduled lift off is 10:49 p.m. EST on Friday, March 9, 2009. Its mission is to answer the question: Are planets out there like Earth?
The Kepler Mission will use a NASA-developed space photometer to search for Earth-like planets orbiting other stars. It will detect the periodic transits (crossings) of a star by its planets (what is often called the transit method by astronomers).
The mission is named in honor of German mathematician and astronomer
Johannes Kepler.
As of Friday morning on March 6th, weather around east-central Florida, the site of the NASA Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral, is good with a 95% chance of favorable launch conditions. Temperature at the launch site is expected to be around 64 degrees Fahrenheit.
Learn more about the mission and the launch schedule at NASA
Kepler Mission: A Search for Habitable Planets.
The mission of the Kepler spacecraft is to seek out and find planets similar to Earth.
Such planets are called extrasolor planets because they orbit around stars other than the Sun.
These extrasolar planets, or exoplanets, have only recently been discovered with the use of ground-based and space-based telescopes.
Page two continues with an explanation of the Kepler Mission.
