High Energy Astronomy Observatory 3
| HEAO-3 | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Type: | Space telescope |
| Country: |
 United States
|
| Operator: | NASA |
| COSPAR-ID : | 1979-082A |
| Mission dates | |
| Dimensions: | 3150 kg |
| Begin: | September 20, 1979, 05:28 UTC |
| Starting place: | Cape Canaveral LC-36B |
| Launcher: | Atlas - Centaur SLV-3D |
| Status: | burned up on December 7, 1981 |
| Orbit data | |
| Rotation time : | 94.5 min |
| Orbit inclination : | 43.6 ° |
| Apogee height : | 503 km |
| Perigee height : | 487 km |
The High Energy Astronomy Observatory 3 (also HEAO-3 or HEAO C ) was a space telescope from NASA optimized for sky surveys in the hard X-ray and gamma range .
HEAO-3 was launched from Cape Canaveral on September 20, 1979 with an Atlas Centaur rocket and was in service until May 29, 1981. The satellite re-entered the earth's atmosphere on December 7, 1981.
The main instrument was a gamma spectrometer for the energy range 50 keV to 10 MeV with an energy resolution of about 3 keV at 1.46 MeV energy and a field of view of 30 °. In addition, there were experiments on the frequency of nuclei of heavy elements in cosmic rays and on the isotopic composition of cosmic rays. The depletion of the coolant for the four germanium detectors in the spectrometer in mid-1980 ended this most important part of the mission. The main result was a sky survey in emission lines of gamma rays.
See also
Web link
- HEAO-3 page at NASA (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ HEAO in the Encyclopedia Astronautica , accessed on July 11, 2011 (English).