NASA’s Swift Boost mission launched from the Marshall Islands on July 3 after a few delays. The goal? Save a falling telescope before it burns up.
LINK is the robot here. Built by Arizona company Katalyst Space, it’s designed to dock with the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory and tow it to a higher orbit. Think space tugboat.
The launch was unconventional. LINK rode a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket strapped to the belly of a plane called Stargazer. The plane climbed to about 40,000 feet over Kwajalein Atoll, dropped the rocket, and off it went.
Ground teams have already made contact with LINK. It’s powered on and will spend the next few weeks going through health checks — propulsion, sensors, navigation. After that, it heads to Swift for a survey.
Then the real work begins. LINK will grab Swift with three robotic arms and pull it up to roughly 370 miles altitude. That should extend the telescope’s life by a decade or so. The whole boost phase takes 10 to 12 weeks.
Why is this urgent? Recent solar activity sped up Swift’s orbital decay. Without LINK’s help, the observatory would fall from orbit before the year ends.
Swift has been studying gamma ray bursts for over 20 years. These flashes release more energy in seconds than the sun will in its entire lifetime. Scientists also use Swift as a cosmic first responder — it gathers critical data when sudden space events happen. Worth saving.
