Improved Orion

Improved Orion is the designation of an American sounding rocket from the Orion series, which is also used by the DLR. The Improved Orion has a peak altitude of 115 km, a takeoff thrust of 7 kN, a launch mass of 400 kg, a diameter of 0.35 m and a length of 5.60 m.

The first flight took place on 6 March 1990 from the launch site Esrange in Sweden. Since then, many flights were made, and by the launch sites Andøya (Norway ) Poker Flat (Alaska ) SvalRak (Spitzbergen ), Wallops Flight Facility ( USA), White Sands (USA) and Alcantara ( Brazil).