A NASA Black Brant IX suborbital-sounding rocket was successfully launched at 9:47 a.m. EDT (11:17 p.m. ACST) July 6, 2022, from the Arnhem Space Centre (ASC) in the Northern Territory of Australia. The launch was for the Suborbital Imaging Spectrograph for Transition region Irradiance from Nearby Exoplanet host stars, or SISTINE, mission for the University of Colorado, Boulder. Preliminary analysis shows that good data was received by the science instrument during the flight.
The rocket carried the science instrument to an altitude of 151miles (243 km) before descending by parachute and landing southwest of the launch site. Recovery operations of the science instrument and the rocket motors are in progress.
SISTINE was the second of three NASA space science missions scheduled from ASC. The X-ray Quantum Calorimeter, or XQC, experiment from the University of Wisconsin successfully launched on June 26, 2022. The next launch, carrying the Dual-channel Extreme Ultraviolet Continuum Experiment, or DEUCE, is scheduled for 6:57 a.m. EDT (8:27 p.m. ACST), July 12, 2022.
