NASA balloon program ready to launch in New Mexico

Taking place at Fort Sumner, New Mexico, the Balloon Program window begins on August 10. The program is run by NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility and includes teams of scientists, engineers and students from a host of different nations.

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“Our annual Fort Sumner campaign is always our most ambitious and packed with cutting-edge science developed from teams here in the United States and around the world,” said Debbie Fairbrother, Scientific Balloon Program chief at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.

One mission on deck is the Exoplanet Climate Infrared Telescope (EXCITE). The mission features a suborbital astronomical telescope developed to study Jupiter-type exoplanets orbiting other stars. After this engineering test flight, a flight on a long-duration super pressure balloon is planned.

The EXCITE mission team is composed of members from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre, Arizona State University, Brown University, Cornell University, Oxford University, University of Rome, StarSpec Technologies, Inc., University of Toronto, and University College London.