After years of delays, NASA is finally poised to launch a satellite to better understand space weather

Update October 9th, 2:55PM ET: NASA delayed the ICON launch due to bad weather at the rocket’s drop zone. The agency will try again Thursday, October 10th at 9:30PM ET. The weather forecast is much better, with a 70 percent chance of favorable conditions.
Original Story: NASA is slated to launch a long-awaited satellite from Florida on Wednesday night that’s designed to help scientists better predict how space weather events will behave high above Earth. But to get to space, the rocket launching this satellite won’t take off from the ground like most others do. Instead, it’ll launch from underneath the wing of a giant airplane, climbing to space from midair.
The mission is named ICON — for Ionospheric Connection Explorer — and it was…

Continue reading…