DENVER BUSINESS JOURNAL - A visually spectacular dawn rocket launch by Centennial-based United Launch Alliance placed a Colorado-built communications satellite into orbit for the U.S. Navy early today.
The Atlas V rocket fired off the launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Base, Florida, into blue skies, leaving a colorful vapor trail hanging in the humid coastal air.
The payload it carried is the Navy's Mobile User Objective Systems (MUOS) satellite, the fourth advanced satellite built by Jefferson County-based Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co. (LMSS) to upgrade data and voice communications for the military.
Once the latest satellite is checked out in orbit and placed into service, the system will provide 16 times the network capacity for more than 55,000 military communications terminals in use worldwide that can be made MUOS-compatible, LMSS says.
Read more at the Denver Business Journal: http://bit.ly/1KsienW
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