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A sounding rocket, sometimes called a research rocket, is an instrument-carrying suborbital rocket designed to take measurements and perform scientific experiments during its flight. The origin of the term comes from the nautical term to take a sounding, meaning to take a measurement.
The rockets are commonly used to take readings or carry instruments from 50 to 1,500 kilometers (30–932 mi) above the surface of the Earth, the altitude in between weather balloons and satellites, the region above the maximum altitude for balloons is approximately 40 km and the minimum for satellites is approximately 120 kilometers (75 mi)[ NASA routinely flies the Terrier Mk 70 boosted Improved Orion lofting 270–450 kilogram (600–1000 lb) payloads into the exoatmospheric region between 100 and 200 kilometers (62–124 mi).]
A common sounding rocket consists of a solid-fuel rocket motor and a payload.[ The freefall part of the flight is an elliptic trajectory with vertical major axis allowing the payload to appear to hover nears its apogee][. The average flight time is less than forty minutes, usually between 5 and 20 minutes][. The rocket consumes its fuel on the first stage of the rising part of the flight, then separates and falls away, leaving the payload to complete the arc and return to the ground with a parachute.]
Sounding rockets are advantageous for some research due to their low cost[, short lead time (sometimes less than six months)][ and their ability (as mentioned above) to conduct research in areas inaccessible to either balloons or satellites. They are also used as test beds for equipment that will be used in more expensive and risky orbital missions.][ The smaller size of a sounding rocket also makes launching from temporary sites possible allowing for field studies at remote locations, even in the middle of the ocean, if fired from a ship.]
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