On Saturday, a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carrying NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope rolled out from the hangar to Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
After arriving at the pad, technicians raised the almost 230-foot rocket to a vertical position. The Falcon Heavy has 27 Merlin engines split evenly between the center core and two side boosters that can generate more than five million pounds of thrust. Roman is roughly the size of a school bus and weighs about as much, requiring a powerful rocket to send it more than a million miles from Earth.
Coverage of the 9 a.m. EDT science briefing will be streamed will stream through a variety of platforms. Learn where to watch online: https://www.nasa.gov/live.
NASA will host several news conferences this morning to discuss the Roman mission.
Following the science briefing, the agency will host a prelaunch news conference at 10:30 a.m., streamed on https://www.nasa.gov/live with the following participants:
NASA and SpaceX are targeting a 7:26 a.m. liftoff on Sunday, Aug. 30 from Launch Complex 39A.
Shawn Domagal-Goldman, director, Astrophysics Division, NASA Headquarters
Julie McEnery, Roman telescope senior project scientist, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Vanessa Bailey, Roman Coronagraph Instrument scientist, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Kristen McQuinn, Roman Science Operations Center lead, Space Telescope Science Institute
Lee Armus, science lead, Roman Science Support Center lead, Caltech/IPAC
Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters
Lucas Paganini, Roman telescope program executive, NASA Headquarters
Jackie Townsend, Roman telescope project manager, NASA Goddard
Denton Gibson, launch director, NASA’s Launch Services Program, NASA Kennedy
Julianna Scheiman, director, NASA Science and Dragon Programs, SpaceX
Justin McReynolds, launch weather officer, 45th Weather Squadron, U.S. Space Force
