WIKIARCHIVES.SPACE

In the Payload Hazardous Service Facility, the Stardust spacecraft sits wrapped in plastic covering. Built by Lockheed Martin Astronautics near Denver, Colo., for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and NASA, the spacecraft Stardust will use a unique medium called aerogel to capture comet particles and interstellar dust for later analysis. Stardust will be launched aboard a Boeing Delta 7426 rocket targeted for Feb. 6, 1999. The collected samples will return to Earth in a re-entry capsule to be jettisoned from Stardust as it swings by Earth in January 2006.