At 10:01 a.m. PST, a team of scientists and engineers will hold their breath as the newest Landsat satellite is launched into space aboard an Atlas V rocket. Landsat 8 carries one of the most sophisticated Earth-observing systems, but it also carries the weight of a record-breaking 40-year-long continuous mission.
The Landsat mission is the longest continuous effort to image the Earth, and it has endured many setbacks, failures and near cancellations to get to this moment. Landsat 8 will both rescue the continuity and advance the scientific capability of the mission, if it reaches orbit. If it doesn’t, it won’t be the first Landsat satellite to fail.
In 1993, Landsat 6 didn’t make it to orbit, leaving the nine-year-old Landsat 5 with the task of staying alive even further beyond its three-year planned mission. Fortunately, the satellite soldiered on until January of this year. Since then, Landsat 7, which was hobbled by a technical failure that affects its ability to image the entire 185-kilometer-wide swath of Earth it covers on each orbital pass, has been carrying the torch alone.
“The failure of Landsat 6 was a big setback,” said Landsat’s lead mission scientist James Irons. “We were very fortunate that Landsat 5 persisted as long as it did or we would have suffered a gap.”
But Landsat 6 was developed and launched outside of NASA’s control by a provate company, and Irons is confident that all should go well for Landsat 8.
“I’m reassured that the NASA process has the utmost rigor in insuring success,” he said. “Still, you realize all rocket launches have some inherent risk, so, it’s just hold your breath and hope everything goes well.”
Watch Live: Historic Landsat Earth-Observing Satellite Launch
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Watch Live: Historic Landsat Earth-Observing Satellite Launch
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Watch Live: Historic Landsat Earth-Observing Satellite Launch
