Air Force set to launch experimental rocket on ORS-4 mission

HiakaSat, a 121-pound (55-kilogram) satellite from the University of Hawaii with a hyperspectral imaging camera to test new Earth observation technologies for military and scientific applications, sits atop the Integrated Payload Stack, or IPS. HiakaSat is the primary payload of the ORS-4 mission. Secondary payloads include: Edison Demonstration of Smallsat Networks, a mission from NASA’s Ames Research Center consisting of eight 1.5U CubeSats about the size of tissue boxes, designed to demonstrate a satellite swarm concept with radio cross-links and reconfigurable software; PrintSat, a NASA-sponsored 1U CubeSat from Montana State University with primary and secondary structural components made with additive manufacturing (3D printing); Argus, another NASA-sponsored 2U CubeSat from St. Louis University, will study how well modern electronics operate in space by comparing their radiation event rates to ground predictions; STACEM, a 3U CubeSat the size of a shoebox sponsored by the National Reconnaissance Office and developed by Utah State University’s Space Dynamics Laboratory to test a new optical sensor in orbit for Earth observation, and; Supernova-Beta, the first orbital test flight of Pumpkin Inc.’s commercial 6U CubeSat bus, about the size of a small handheld toolbox. Air Force Space Command’s Space and Missile Systems Center at Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo, Calif., in partnership with the Operationally Responsive Space Office and Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico, the University of Hawaii/Hawaii Space Flight Laboratory, the Pacific Missile Range Facility and the Aerojet Rocketdyne Corporation in Rancho Cordova (Sacramento), Calif., prepared the ORS-4 demonstration mission aboard an experimental Super Strypi launch system to establish baseline performance of this new launch capability by placing 13 satellites into polar orbit from the Pacific Missile Range Facility at Barking Sands, Kauai, Hawaii. (U.S. Air Force photo)