Atlas
II Launch Vehicle
Unofficial
names/slang: n/a
Function:
Launch vehicle
Date
deployed: Feb. 10, 1992
Contractor:
Lockheed Martin - airframe, assembly, avionics, test
and systems integration; Rocketdyne (Atlas engine,
MA-5); Pratt & Whitney (Centaur engine, RL-10)
and Honeywell & Teledyne (avionics)
Unit cost:
unavailable
Diameter:
Core: 10' - 0"
Wingspan:
none
Height:
156' - 0"
Thrust at
Liftoff: 494,500 lbs
Weight - max
take-off: 414,000 lbs (231,870 kg)
Lift
Capability: unavailable
Payloads:
unavailable
Guidance
System: unavailable
Engines:
(3) MA-5A
Rocketdyne engines, (2) Pratt & Whitney RL10A-4
Centaur engines
Models:
II, IIA, and IIAS |
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Mission:
Atlas II is a member of the Atlas family of launch vehicles,
which evolved from the successful Atlas intercontinental
ballistic missile (ICBM) program. It is designed to launch
payloads into low earth orbit, geosynchronous transfer orbit
or geosynchronous orbit.
Features: Atlas II provides higher performance
than the earlier Atlas I by using engines with greater
thrust and longer fuel tanks for both stages. The total
thrust capability of the Atlas II of 490,000 pounds enables
the booster to lift payloads of 6,100 pounds in
geosynchronous orbit (22,000 miles-plus). This series uses
an improved Centaur upper stage – the world’s
first high-energy propellant stage – to increase its
payload capability. Atlas II also has lower-cost
electronics, an improved flight computer and longer
propellant tanks than its predecessor, Atlas I.
Atlas IIs are launched
from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FL., by the 45th
Space Wing and, in the future, will be launched by the 30th
Space Wing at Vandenberg Air Force Base, CA.
Background: The Atlas was originally fielded as
an ICBM in the early 1960s. The Air Force replaced the Atlas
ICBMs with Minuteman missiles and converted them into space
launch vehicles in the late 1960s.
NASA used the Atlas as a space launch vehicle as early
as 1958. Atlas served as the launch vehicle for Project
Score, the world’s first communications satellite. The
satellite broadcast President Eisenhower’s pre-recorded
Christmas message around the world.
An Atlas booster carried U.S. astronaut John Glenn
into orbit under Project Mercury, the first U.S. manned
space program. Atlas space launch vehicles were used in all
three unmanned lunar exploration programs. Atlas Centaur
vehicles also launched Mariner and Pioneer planetary probes.
In May 1988, the Air Force chose General Dynamics (now
Lockheed-Martin) to develop the Atlas II vehicle, primarily
to launch Defense Satellite Communications System payloads
and for commercial users as a result of Atlas I launch
failures in the late 1980s.
The Atlas booster has been in use for more than 25
years and remains a key part of the U.S. Space Program.
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