NASA Television to Air Launch of Next Planet-Hunting Mission

On a mission to detect planets outside of our solar system, NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is scheduled to launch no earlier than 6:32 p.m. EDT Monday, April 16. Prelaunch mission coverage will begin on NASA Television and the agency’s website Sunday, April 15, with three live briefings.

TESS is NASA’s next step in the search for planets outside of our solar system, known as exoplanets, including those that could support life. The mission is expected to catalog thousands of planet candidates and vastly increase the current number of known exoplanets. TESS will find the most promising exoplanets orbiting relatively nearby stars, giving future researchers a rich set of new targets for more comprehensive follow-up studies, including the potential to assess their capacity to harbor life.

NASA TV coverage is as follows:

Sunday, April 15

11 a.m. – NASA Social Mission Overview

Martin Still, TESS program scientist at NASA Headquarters
Tom Barclay, TESS scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Jenn Burt, Torres postdoctoral fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Zach Berta-Thompson, assistant professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder
Natalia Guerrero, TESS researcher at MIT
Robert Lockwood, TESS spacecraft program manager with Orbital ATK
Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of Build and Flight Reliability at SpaceX
Jesse Christiansen, staff scientist with the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute at Caltech
Elisa Quintana, TESS scientist at Goddard
1 p.m. – Prelaunch news conference

Sandra Connelly, deputy associate administrator of programs for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate
Omar Baez, launch director for NASA’s Launch Services Program
Jeff Volosin, TESS project manager at Goddard
Mike McAleenan, weather officer with the U.S. Air Force 45th Weather Squadron
Robert Lockwood
Hans Koenigsmann
3 p.m. – Science news conference

Paul Hertz, Astrophysics division director at NASA Headquarters
George Ricker, TESS principal investigator at MIT
Padi Boyd, TESS Guest Investigator Program lead at Goddard
Stephen Rinehart, TESS project scientist at Goddard
Diana Dragomir, postdoctoral fellow at MIT
Monday, April 16

10 a.m. – NASA EDGE: TESS    

This half-hour live show will discuss the TESS spacecraft, the science of searching for planets outside our solar system, and the launch from Cape Canaveral.
6 p.m. – Launch coverage begins

6:32 p.m. – Launch

TESS will launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The deadline for media accreditation for this launch has passed. For information about media accreditation, contact ksc-media-accreditat@mail.nasa.gov.

For the latest schedule of prelaunch briefings, events and NASA TV coverage, visit:

https://www.nasa.gov/content/tess-prelaunch-briefings-and-events

Learn more about TESS at:

https://www.nasa.gov/tess