.COM
ProSEDS
Scheduled to launch March 29,
2003
The Propulsive Small Expendable Deployer
system - called ProSEDS - is a tether-based propulsion experiment
that draws power from the space environment around Earth, allowing
the transfer of energy from the Earth to the spacecraft.
Inexpensive and reusable, ProSEDS
technology has the potential to turn orbiting, in-space tethers into
"space tugboats" -- replacing heavy, costly, traditional chemical
propulsion and enabling a variety of space-based missions, such as
the fuel-free raising and lowering of satellite orbits.
The flight of ProSEDS, scheduled for early
in 2003, will mark the first time a tether system is used for
propulsion. To be launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station,
Fla., ProSEDS will fly aboard an Air Force Delta II rocket and
demonstrate an electrodynamic tether's ability to generate
significant thrust.
February 25, 1996
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