WAC Corporal
WAC or WAC Corporal is the name of the first sounding rocket developed in the USA . The origin of the name WAC has not been finally clarified. It could stand for "Without Attitude Control" because the missile had no attitude control. There are also sources according to which WAC stands for "Women's Army Corps", the female auxiliary corps of the US Army .
The WAC was a liquid rocket that used fuming nitric acid as an oxidizer and a mixture of aniline and furyl alcohol as fuel . At the start the WAC used a solid rocket . The uncontrolled WAC was started on September 27, 1945 for the first time and on June 12, 1947 for the last time. However, from 1949 it was used as the upper level of the bumper . The WAC had a takeoff mass of 658 kg, a diameter of 0.31 m and a length of 7.34 m. Their summit height was 75 km.
Web links
- Redstone Arsenal: Timeline of WAC Corporal Development ( Memento of March 10, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
- WAC in the Encyclopedia Astronautica (English)