LITE Background
LITE was flown aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery, September 9 - 20, 1994, in a
near-circular, 57 degree inclined orbit, at an altitude of 140 n mi for the
first part of the mission and descending to 130 n mi in the latter part of the
mission. The orbital period was approximately 90 minutes with a ground track
velocity of about 7.4 km per second. LITE was operated in a nadir viewing mode
from the shuttle cargo bay. With the LITE laser pulsing at 10 Hz, a series of
circular footprints were drawn out on the surface of the earth. The diameter
of a footprint is approximately 300 meters, and the separation between centers
of adjacent footprints is approximately 740 meters. Fifty three hours of
LITE data were obtained over 10 days of measurements.