Mobile Rocket Base
DLR department for mobile rocket and balloon research missions.
Part of the DLR Space Operations and Astronaut Training center near Munich, the Mobile Rocket Base (MORABA) has carried out high-altitude scientific missions with unmanned rockets and balloons since the 1960s. It also builds the mechanical and electrical systems for these flights. Its research covers the upper atmosphere, microgravity, astronomy, geophysics, materials science, and hypersonics.
Quick Facts
- Founded
- 1965
- Location
- Oberpfaffenhofen near Munich
- Parent organization
- DLR Space Operations and Astronaut Training
- First campaign
- May 1966 on the Greek island of Euboea
- First texus launch
- December 13, 1977
Facts from the source article.
Divisions of MORABA
The Mobile Infrastructure group operates mobile ground stations and antennas for telemetry and tele-command, as well as range instrumentation radar for trajectory measurement. It also provides ground support systems for communication and power supplies, and handles tracking, RF data reception, data processing, distribution, archiving, transport, setup, maintenance, and mission preparation. The Electrical Flight Systems group develops, builds, and qualifies onboard electrical and electronic systems, including computers, control and measurement equipment, data management, telemetry components, and RF transmission systems. It calibrates and flies attitude, rate, and acceleration sensors, and develops cold gas rate and attitude control systems. This group also constructs Electrical Ground Support Equipment. The Mechanical Flight Systems group performs structural, aerodynamic, and thermal analyses, handles payload and vehicle configuration and design, integrates scientific experiments, and performs spin balancing. It also develops and maintains separation and payload recovery systems. The Launch Services group procures, inspects, modifies, and stores rocket motors and pyrotechnics, sets up mobile launch pads, assembles rocket stages and ignition systems, integrates payload and motors, and loads the rocket onto the launcher. It also supports flight safety, trajectory and aerodynamic calculations, and rocket configuration selection.
History
The Mobile Rocket Base originated from the Working Group For Space Exploration, a joint foundation of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics and the former German Laboratory for Aviation, established in 1965 with initial headquarters in Munich. Since April 1969, it has been located in Oberpfaffenhofen within the DLR department Space Operations and Astronaut Training. Its first mobile campaign, for the European Space Research Organisation, studied a solar eclipse in May 1966 on the Greek island of Euboea, demonstrating the ability to rapidly move and set up extensive equipment in a remote location. In spring 1967, a campaign with the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics at Esrange, Sweden, used five Nike-Apache rockets to create artificial barium clouds at about 100 km altitude to visualize Earth's magnetic field lines. Launch sites have included Scandinavia (Kiruna and Andenes), Sardinia, Wallops Island, Matagorda Island, White Sands, Greenland, Trivandrum, Woomera, Huelva, Natal, and Adelaide Island. Subsequent sounding rocket work focused on upper atmosphere research and global warming causes. The HEATPIPE 1 payload, built by Dornier, launched on January 22, 1976 at Esrange to study heat pipes and latent heat storage in microgravity for future satellites. Initially a supplement to German Spacelab missions, the first TEXUS payload flew on December 13, 1977 on a two-stage Skylark rocket at Esrange. Later, up to four TEXUS missions per year (6 minutes of microgravity) were flown, and the Swedish MASER programme, the MAXUS programme (13 minutes microgravity), and the MiniTEXUS programme (3 minutes microgravity) were initiated under the European Space Agency.
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