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Technology Stocks : Orbital science (ORB) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Angelo J Cici who wrote (915)	2/23/1998 10:11:00 AM
From: Mohan Marette	Respond to of 2394

Company Press Release SOURCE: Orbital Sciences Corporation Orbital's Pegasus Launch of SNOE and BATSAT Satellites Set for February 25 Company to Conduct 20th Mission of Pegasus Rocket DULLES, Va., Feb. 23 /PRNewswire/ -- Orbital Sciences Corporation (Nasdaq: ORBI - news) announced today that the next launch of the company's Pegasus rocket is now planned for Wednesday, February 25, 1998. The mission was originally scheduled for February 4 but was delayed due to poor weather conditions in California. On this mission, the 20th in the Pegasus program's history, Orbital will launch two satellites, NASA's Student Nitric Oxide Explorer (SNOE) and the Orbital-built Broadband Advanced Technology (BATSAT) communications satellite. The launch will originate from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, and is subject to final preparations and testing, as well as acceptable weather conditions at the launch site. On the launch day, Orbital's L-1011 aircraft will carry the winged Pegasus XL rocket to approximately 39,000 feet at a predetermined location over the Pacific Ocean, where the rocket will be released. After a flight of approximately 11 minutes, Pegasus will first deliver SNOE into its planned circular orbit at an altitude of 580 kilometers, inclined at 97.75 degrees. The rocket will then deploy the BATSAT satellite into approximately the same orbit. The SNOE/BATSAT launch is scheduled to occur at approximately 11:04 p.m. (PST), with a time window that extends from about 11:00 p.m. to 11:10 p.m. (PST). Initial information from the SNOE satellite is expected to be gathered as it passes over a ground station at Poker Flat, Alaska, about an hour and a half after its deployment. Information from BATSAT should be received about nine hours after launch at Orbital's satellite ground control station at the company's Dulles, Virginia, headquarters. The SNOE spacecraft and its instruments were designed and built by a student team at the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics under the Student Explorer Demonstration Initiative (STEDI) program, which is funded by NASA and managed by the Universities Space Research Association. The 254 pound SNOE satellite will investigate the effects of energy from the sun and the magnetosphere on the density of nitric oxide in the Earth's upper atmosphere. The extreme variability of nitric oxide may be important to ozone chemistry in the middle atmosphere as well. BATSAT is a 154-pound commercial communications satellite based on Orbital's MicroStar(TM) spacecraft platform. Originally developed to meet the cost and schedule requirements of the ORBCOMM communications system, the disc- shaped MicroStar has served as the basis for 13 satellites that are in orbit and operating successfully today. The latest launch of MicroStar satellites occurred on February 10, 1998, when two ORBCOMM satellites were deployed by Orbital's Taurus rocket. Almost 30 more MicroStar satellites are now in production for ORBCOMM and other programs. Orbital is a space and information systems company that designs, manufactures, operates and markets a broad range of affordable space infrastructure systems, satellite access products and satellite-provided services including launch vehicles, satellites, sensors and electronics, satellite ground systems and software, satellite-based navigation and communications products, and satellite-delivered fixed and mobile communications and Earth imaging services. SOURCE: Orbital Sciences Corporation