The remote high resolution infrared imagery of the shuttle orbiter lower surfaces during entry to obtain accurate measurements of aerodynamic heat transfer will occur on the first shuttle flight. These images will have a spatial resolution of 1 meter or better and a temperature resolution of 2.5% for temperatures between 800 and 1900°K. The experiment is accomplished utilizing an aircraft on station along the predicted shuttle entry ground track at an altitude of 14Km and having on board a telescope with an aperture of about 100 cm. Tracking of the shuttle, prior to encounter with the main on board telescope, is necessary to correct for shuttle entry uncertainties, aircraft position uncertainty and platform drift. Once acquisition of the shuttle is accomplished, a closed loop servo takes the system to complete encounter and the subsequent infrared images as the shuttle passes through the field of view of the 91.5 cm Kuiper Airborne Observatory operated out of NASA Ames Research Center.
Remote Infrared Imagery Of Shuttle During Entry
Los Alamos Conference on Optics 1979 ; 1979 ; Los Alamos,United States
Proc. SPIE ; 0190
1980-11-13
Conference paper
Electronic Resource
English
Remote infrared imagery of shuttle during entry
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