Minotaur Launch, August 23, 2007 |
(Download a higher resolution picture by clicking on any
picture below.)
A Minotaur rocket was launched from LF-06 at Vandenberg Air Force Base at 1:31 Am on Thursday, August 23, 2007. This was a 129.4-second exposure.
Time lapse movie of the launch. 3/4-second long exposures were made once per second duriung the launch. The speed of the action has been increased by 15x.
The separation of the first stage produced several glowing objects that trailed behind and below the ascending Minotaur.
The separation of the first stage of the Minotaur produced a number of glowing objects that trailed behind the ascending rocket. The first stage blinked as it tumbled. The speed of the action is increased by 5x.
A glowing cloud resulting from the separation of the first stage of the Minotaur appears in the center of the image. It looked a lot like the Milky Way on the right side of the image except that it drifted across the sky and faded.
30-second long exposures were made each thirty-one seconds during the period from 1:39 AM to 2:01 AM. The speed of the action has been increased by 155x.
Photographs of rocket and missile launches
from Vandenberg Air Force Base from 1982 to 1996.
More photographs of rocket and missile launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base from 1997
to the present.
Book about
missiles and rockets available from 
The Missile and Space Race by Alan J. Levine. Here is a history of the development of military missiles and space travel from World War II to the American visits to the Moon in 1969-1972. It stresses the relationship between the early stages of space exploration and the arms race, and that a dual path led to space flight. One was the development of unmanned long-range war rockets, the other, less often noted, was the rocket-powered research plane. The first path led through the intercontinental ballistic missile to the first artificial satellites and space capsule; the latter, more uniquely American, through the X-series and Skyrocket rocket planes to the X-15, and ultimately to the Space Shuttle. The early part of the book focuses on the Soviet-American race to develop the ICBM in the 1950s, and the first satellites, with particular attention paid to the events and reactions that followed the flight of Sputnik I in 1957 and the subsequent missile gap era.
Link to the home page of the 
30th
Space Wing
Call the Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Hotline at (805) 606-1857 for current launch schedule information.
The So Cal Sky Lights web site has rocket launches and other sky phenomena.
Link to the NASA rocket launch manifest
For national and international space coverage visit SPACE.com
Brian Webb's Rawhide Space Page provides launch schedule and ham radio information.
.
You can buy a 2020 calendar featuring my photographs of rocket launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base.
Photos of thirteen rocket launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base:
Pegasus-XL/Wide-Field Infra-red Explorer (WIRE) March 4, 1999
Atlas-IIAS/Terra December 18, 1999
Delta II/Gravity Probe B, April 20, 2004
Minotaur/Streak September 22, 2005
Titan IV/National Reconnaissance Office satellite, October 19, 2005
Minuteman III, February 16, 2006
Minuteman III, April 2, 2008
Target Launch Vehicle, September 24, 2008
Delta-II/GeoEye 1, September 6, 2008
Delta II/Jason 2, June 20, 2008
Delta II/COSMO-Skymed, October 24, 2008
Taurus/Orbiting Carbon Observatory, February 24, 2009
Delta-II/Worldview 2, October 28, 2009
Put a copy of the Rocket Launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base: 2020 Calendar in your Lulu.com shopping cart for $14.95.
Send a message to Brian.
Go to home page of the Goleta Air and Space Museum.