NASA TOMEX+ rocket to launch from Wallops Flight Facility

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. — NASA plans to launch its TOMEX+ sounding rocket mission on Monday with a window running from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. EDT. The rockets will lift off from the Wallops Flight Facility on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

The Turbulent Oxygen Mixing Experiment Plus (TOMEX+) aims to study the mesopause, one of the most dynamic layers of Earth’s atmosphere. Led by Jim Clemmons, a physics and astronomy professor at the University of New Hampshire, the mission will examine how energy moves through this turbulent region.

TOMEX+ will specifically investigate a thin layer of atomic sodium about 56 miles (90 kilometers) above Earth. This layer forms from tiny meteors that burn up in the upper atmosphere. A laser on board the rockets will make the sodium atoms glow, acting as a natural tracer