The spacecraft set to provide the closest look ever at a comet nucleus was shipped today from The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland - where it was designed and built - to NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for its next round of prelaunch testing.

Scheduled to launch July 1 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, the Comet Nucleus Tour (CONTOUR) spacecraft spent the past 10 days in an APL vibration test lab, where engineers checked the structural integrity of the eight-sided, 6-by-6 foot craft aboard a large shake table.

CONTOUR Spacecraft

"The vibration tests at APL went very well," says CONTOUR Project Manager Mary C. Chiu of APL. "The spacecraft is in great shape, and we're ready to move on to the next stage."

At Goddard the spacecraft will undergo spin tests; acoustic tests, designed to simulate the noise-induced vibrations of launch; and thermal vacuum tests, which replicate the harsh conditions of deep space. In late April, CONTOUR will be transported to Kennedy Space Center/Cape Canaveral and prepared for launch aboard a three-stage, Boeing Delta II launch vehicle.

"By the time CONTOUR launches it will have been thoroughly tested," says Michael J. Colby, CONTOUR lead integration and test engineer at APL. "You have to be extremely confident that the spacecraft will be OK when it's mounted on that Delta."

For more details about the mission, visit the CONTOUR web site.