NASA To Host Media Teleconference On Probes' Moon Orbit Insertion

Dwayne Brown     
Headquarters, Washington

DC Agle

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
 
Caroline McCall
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge
 
PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA will hold a media teleconference at 11 a.m. PST on Wednesday, Dec. 28, to preview twin spacecraft being placed in orbit around the moon on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

NASA's twin lunar Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) probes were launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Sept. 10, 2011. GRAIL-A is scheduled to arrive in lunar orbit beginning at 1:21 p.m. PST on Saturday, Dec. 31, and GRAIL-B on Sunday, Jan. 1, beginning at 2:05 p.m. PST. After confirmation they are in orbit and operating nominally, the two solar-powered spacecraft will fly in tandem orbits to answer longstanding questions about the moon and give scientists a better understanding of how Earth and other rocky planets in the solar system formed.

Participants are:

- Maria Zuber, principal investigator, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge

- David Lehman, project manager, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, Calif.

To participate, reporters must contact the JPL Media Relations Office at 818-354-5011 by 10:30 a.m. PST on Dec. 28 for the call-in number and passcode.

Audio of the teleconference will be streamed at http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio.

Supporting images will be available 15 minutes prior to the teleconference at http://1.usa.gov/grailnews.

For more information about GRAIL visit http://www.nasa.gov/grail.

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