NASA prepares for its next hot mission

Posted on: Jul. 26th, 2004 || Source: freep.com | E-mail Article | Print Article

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- NASA is about to embark on its hottest mission ever -- to Mercury.

The Messenger spacecraft, to be launched next week, will be blasted by heat up to 700 degrees as it orbits the tiny planet closest to the sun. Remarkably, the only thing between the probe's room-temperature science instruments and the blistering sun and pizza-oven heat will be a handmade ceramic-cloth quilt just one-quarter of an inch thick.

"If it doesn't stay toward the sun," the sun "will fry everything," said Neal Bachtell, mechanical technician and master quilter.

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