Brenda Marie Rivers
United Launch Alliance has delivered rocket hardware that will help launch the fifth Advanced Extremely High Frequency communications satellite at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on June 27, Spaceflight Now reported Friday.
ULA’s Mariner vessel shipped the first and second stages of an Atlas 5 rocket the company will use to send the AEHF-5 satellite into space.
The firm's personnel stacked Atlas 5’s first stage in a vertical position onto the spaceport’s Complex 41 launch pad and will integrate the Centaur upper stage with other components in the coming weeks. The rocket is designed with Aerojet Rocketdyne-made boosters.
Lockheed Martin built AEHF-5 at a facility in Sunnyvale, Calif., and transported the spacecraft to Florida via a C-5 airlifter. The satellite is equipped with a communications payload technology from Northrop Grumman.
