Closed Fairing Dooms Glory Mission

By Michael Mecham mecham@aviationweek.com
SAN FRANCISCO

A payload fairing that failed to open prevented the Orbital Sciences Taurus XL 3110 launcher carrying the Glory climate monitoring satellite from achieving orbit after liftoff at 2:09 a.m. PST from Vandenberg AFB, Calif.

The launch was nominal through Stage 3 separation until about 4.5 min. into the flight, when tracking stations at Point Mugu, Calif., and Vandenberg reported the failure of the ...

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