The Gerard P. Kuiper Airborne Observatory (KAO) was a national facility operated by

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

to support research in

infrared astronomy Infrared astronomy is a sub-discipline of astronomy which specializes in the observation and analysis of astronomical objects using infrared (IR) radiation. The wavelength of infrared light ranges from 0.75 to 300 micrometers, and falls in betw ...

. The observation platform was a highly modified Lockheed C-141A Starlifter jet transport aircraft (s/n: 6110, registration: N714NA, callsign: NASA 714) with a range of 6,000 nautical miles (11,000 km), capable of conducting research operations at altitudes of up to 48,000 feet (14 km).

Aircraft

The KAO was based at the

Ames Research Center The Ames Research Center (ARC), also known as NASA Ames, is a major NASA research center at Moffett Federal Airfield in California's Silicon Valley. It was founded in 1939 as the second National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) labo ...

NAS Moffett Field Moffett Federal Airfield , also known as Moffett Field, is a joint civil-military airport located in an unincorporated part of Santa Clara County, California, United States, between northern Mountain View and northern Sunnyvale. On November 10, ...

, near Sunnyvale, California. Prior to its conversion to the airborne observatory, it had served as Lockheed's demonstrator for a potential civilian version of the C-141. Though it began operation in 1974 as a replacement for an earlier aircraft, the Galileo Observatory (itself a converted Convair 990 (N711NA) that was destroyed in a collision with a U.S. Navy

Lockheed P-3C Orion The Lockheed P-3 Orion is a four-engined, turboprop anti-submarine and maritime surveillance aircraft developed for the United States Navy and introduced in the 1960s. Lockheed based it on the L-188 Electra commercial airliner. The KAO flew at altitudes of 41,000 to 45,000 feet, and flew a total of 1,417 times. The KAO has a 160-foot wingspan, measures 145 feet long, and stands 39 feet high. A typical crew consisted of two pilots, a flight engineer, the mission staff, and the flight team, and the aircraft provided a stable platform for missions lasting up to seven and a half hours. The KAO flew mostly out of

Moffett Field Moffett Federal Airfield , also known as Moffett Field, is a joint civil-military airport located in an unincorporated part of Santa Clara County, California, United States, between northern Mountain View and northern Sunnyvale. On November 10 ...

, but also flew out of

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

, Australia,

American Samoa American Samoa ( sm, Amerika Sāmoa, ; also ' or ') is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the South Pacific Ocean, southeast of the island country of Samoa. Its location is centered on . It is east of the Internationa ...

Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Co ...

, Japan,

Guam Guam (; ch, Guåhan ) is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States in the Micronesia subregion of the western Pacific Ocean. It is the westernmost point and territory of the United States (reckoned from the geographic cent ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

Ecuador Ecuador ( ; ; Quechua: ''Ikwayur''; Shuar: ''Ecuador'' or ''Ekuatur''), officially the Republic of Ecuador ( es, República del Ecuador, which literally translates as "Republic of the Equator"; Quechua: ''Ikwadur Ripuwlika''; Shuar: ' ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

, Houston (Texas), and

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...

. During a flight in 1978 that took off from American Samoa, two of the observatory's four engines failed soon after takeoff, and after the aircraft staggered and instrument power was shut down, the flight engineer had to crank down the landing gear manually.

Telescope

The KAO's telescope was a conventional Cassegrain reflector with a 36-inch (91.5 cm)

aperture In optics, an aperture is a hole or an opening through which light travels. More specifically, the aperture and focal length of an optical system determine the cone angle of a bundle of rays that come to a focus in the image plane. An ...

, designed primarily for observations in the 1 to 500 μm spectral range. Its flight capability allowed it to rise above almost all of the

water vapor (99.9839 °C) , - , Boiling point , , - , specific gas constant , 461.5 J/( kg·K) , - , Heat of vaporization , 2.27 MJ/kg , - , Heat capacity , 1.864 kJ/(kg·K) Water vapor, water vapour or aqueous vapor is the gaseous p ...

in the Earth's atmosphere (allowing observations of

infrared Infrared (IR), sometimes called infrared light, is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than those of visible light. It is therefore invisible to the human eye. IR is generally understood to encompass wavelengths from around ...

radiation, which is blocked before reaching ground-based facilities), as well as travel to almost any point on the Earth's surface for an observation.

History

The KAO made several major discoveries, including the first sightings of the

rings Ring may refer to: * Ring (jewellery), a round band, usually made of metal, worn as ornamental jewelry * To make a sound with a bell, and the sound made by a bell :(hence) to initiate a telephone connection Arts, entertainment and media Film and ...

Uranus Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. Its name is a reference to the Greek god of the sky, Uranus ( Caelus), who, according to Greek mythology, was the great-grandfather of Ares (Mars), grandfather of Zeus (Jupiter) and father of ...

in 1977 and a definitive identification of an atmosphere on

Pluto Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the Sun. It is the largest ...

in 1988. The KAO was used to study the origin and distribution of water and

organic molecule In chemistry, organic compounds are generally any chemical compounds that contain carbon-hydrogen or carbon-carbon bonds. Due to carbon's ability to catenate (form chains with other carbon atoms), millions of organic compounds are known. Th ...

s in regions of star formation, and in the vast spaces between the stars. Kuiper astronomers also studied the disks surrounding certain stars that may be related to the formation of planetary systems around these stars. It took infrared spectrum measurements of the planet Mercury in 1995. No quartz or olivine in Mercury's surface rocks was detected. Peering still deeper into space, KAO astronomers studied powerful far-infrared emissions from the center of our galaxy and other galaxies. Scientists on board the KAO tracked the formation of heavy elements like iron, nickel, and cobalt from the massive fusion reactions of supernova SN 1987A. ACD08-0005-063

The KAO was retired in 1995 and is viewable at

, although it is no longer airworthy. It has been succeeded by a Boeing 747-based airborne observatory equipped with a larger aperture telescope, the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA). SOFIA completed its first test flight on April 26, 2007 and its telescope saw first light on May 26, 2010. Initial "routine" science observation flights began in December 2010 and the observatory is at full capability with about 100 flights per year.

SOFIA Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and h ...

was recently retired, with its last flight on September 30, 2022.

References

External links

About the Kuiper Airborne Observatory
* ttp://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/watchtheskies/kuiper.html Kuiper Airborne Observatory Marks 30th Anniversary of its Dedicationbr>NASA's Kuiper Airborne Observatory, 1971–1995:An Operations Retrospective With a View to SOFIA
nasa.gov {{Authority control Airborne observatories NASA vehicles Ames Research Center Individual aircraft Gerard Kuiper

Aircraft

Telescope

History

See also

References

External links