Secondary Payload Hardware To Fly on Atlas in October

摘要

An Atlas 5 rocket slated to lift off in October will mark the first flight of a secondary payload ring the U.S. Air Force developed to carry up to six small satellites on any Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) that has room to spare. The most high-profile pay-load on the October launch is Orbital Express, a two-spacecraft satellite-refueling experiment sponsored by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. But in many ways, the five small, experimental satellites sharing the ride on the so-called EELV Secondary Payload Adapter (ESPA) ring is actually the primary payload.