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Public Affairs Office
Naval Research Laboratory
Washington, D.C.

1/20/2003

NRL Press Release 12-03r

NRL Donates Clementine Spacecraft to National Air and Space Museum
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The Naval Research Laboratory has donated the engineering model of the 
Clementine satellite for display at the Smithsonian Institution's 
National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.  Clementine is known 
for taking approximately two million photographs of the moon's surface 
during the 1990s. The display of the engineering model of the 
satellite is being marked with a ceremony to be held on Wednesday, 
January 22 at 7:00 pm. 

Clementine was developed by NRL as a project jointly sponsored by NASA 
and the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. It was launched in 
January 1994 to space qualify lightweight imaging sensors and 
component technologies for the next generation of Department of 
Defense spacecraft. The images returned by Clementine were the first 
high-resolution images of the moon collected since the Apollo lunar 
landing in 1972.  In addition to taking several million photos of the 
moon, Clementine was significant in finding evidence of water on the 
lunar surface.

Clementine was a "fast-track" program from its inception. The work on 
the spacecraft was completed in just 22 months, less than half the 
time usually required to build a spacecraft like Clementine. And with 
the spacecraft and launch vehicle costing $75 million, it was built 
for about one-fifth the usual cost. The Lawrence Livermore National 
Laboratory developed the sensor suite used in the spacecraft and other
federal agencies provided support. Clementine showed the capability of 
the national laboratories, working with DoD, NASA, industry and 
international space organization, to integrate, execute and operate 
meaningful space missions at low cost.

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