A planet-hunting NASA telescope today reached its Cape Canaveral launch pad in preparation for flight next month.The Kepler telescope was delivered from Astrotech in Titusville to Launch Complex 17 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station around 5:30 a.m. today.
It is scheduled to blast off at 10:48 p.m. March 5 aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket, the Cape's second unmanned launch this year.
Over the mission's planned 3.5-year life, Kepler will scan 100,000 Milky Way stars for Earth-like "exoplanets" (outside our solar system) by tracking their transits across the stars.
Though the telescope will likely spot much bigger planets, and some smaller ones, it will focus on Earth-size planets within stars' "habitable zones" - areas where temperatures would make liquid water possible, and possibly life.
Workers at Astrotech in Titusville on Wednesday secured the telescope in a transportation canister, and trucked it to the Cape early this morning.
The spacecraft and its third stage booster aer scheduled to be mated to the Delta II on Friday.
Scientists hope the roughly $600 million Kepler mission provide statistics about how common or uncommon Earth-like planets are in the galaxy.
The findings could answer ancient questions about the possibility of life beyond Earth, and suggest places for future exploration.
You can read this Kepler fact sheet for more information, or click here to link to NASA's Kepler mission page.
IMAGE NOTE: click to enlarge the image above. At Astrotech's Hazardous Processing Facility in Titusville, Fla., on Monday, workers positioned the Kepler spacecraft onto a Delta II third stage. Photo credit: NASA/Troy Cryder
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