Total Solar Eclipse 2024: NASA To Launch Sounding Rockets Into Moon’s Shadow; Here's Why

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is scheduled to launch three sounding rockets during the total solar eclipse on April 8.

This launch is planned to examine the changes in the Earth’s upper atmosphere as the Moon settles in between the Sun and the Earth. During this duration, the daylight will get dim in certain regions on the Earth.

The Atmospheric Perturbations around Eclipse Path (APEP) sounding rockets will launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. These rockets will examine the disturbances created in the ionosphere when the Moon eclipses the Sun. 

During the annular solar eclipse in October 2023, sounding rockets were launched and successfully recovered from the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico, NASA said.

These rockets have been refurbished with new instrumentation and will be relaunched in April.

Aroh Barjatya, a professor of engineering physics at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida, will lead the mission where he will direct the Space and Atmospheric Instrumentation Lab.

This year, the sounding rockets will be launched three times- the first one will be launched 45 minutes before the eclipse, the second one, during the eclipse, and the third one, after the local eclipse. 

These intervals are significant for capturing data when the Sun disappears and its effect on the ionosphere, the kind of disturbance it creates, and the potential interference in communication. 

The ionosphere is a region in the Earth’s atmosphere between 90 to 500 km above the ground. Barjatya added, “It’s an electrified region that reflects and refracts radio signals, and also impacts satellite communications as the signals pass through.”

Barjatya highlighted that understanding the ionosphere and developing models could help the team predict disturbances, which is crucial to ensure that an increasingly communication-dependent world operates smoothly.

According to NASA, it is challenging to monitor short-term changes in the ionosphere during an eclipse with satellites because they may or may not be present on the eclipse path at the right time. 

NASA’s targeted sounding rockets can help study the effects of the eclipse at the right time and all altitudes of the ionosphere.

The APEP rockets are scheduled to reach a maximum altitude of 420 km. According to NASA, each rocket will measure charged and neutral particle density and surrounding electric and magnetic fields. 

“Each rocket will eject four secondary instruments the size of a two-litre soda bottle that also measure the same data points, so it's similar to results from 15 rockets, while only launching three,” elaborated Barjatya. 

He further added that the NASA team is super excited to relaunch these rockets during the total eclipse, to see if the perturbations start at the same altitude and if their magnitude and scale remain the same.

This is a rare moment for scientists to capture crucial data as the next total solar eclipse is not expected until 2044 over the contiguous United States.

This launch will be live-streamed on NASA’s Wallops’ official YouTube channel and NASA’s official broadcast channel.