The Solar Dynamics Observatory and the Atlas V rocket that will carry it into space are being prepared for another launch attempt Thursday morning after an earlier try was scrubbed because of high winds. The launch window for Thursday runs from 10:23 a.m. to 11:23 a.m. The weather forecast improves to a 60 percent chance of acceptable conditions.
The SDO spacecraft is headed to an orbit about 22,300 miles above Earth. From that altitude, the spacecraft will point its instruments at the sun and relay the readings instantly to a ground station in New Mexico. The research is expected to reveal the sun's inner workings by constantly taking high resolution images of the sun, collecting readings from inside the sun and measuring its magnetic field activity. This data is expected to give researchers the insight they need to eventually predict solar storms and other activity on the sun that can affect spacecraft in orbit, astronauts on the International Space Station and electronic and other systems on Earth.
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