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Space Shuttle Discovery sits on Launch Pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. This mission, STS-119, was the Discovery’s 36th launch. “We put the Delta IV together in the Horizontal Integration Facility where we receive incoming equipment that must go through various tasks and check outs to ensure everything is ready for launch,” said Captain Bogue. “This is where we take care of everything before we move it to the launch pad. It is a long, tedious process to get the launch system ready. It takes a lot of teamwork from the United Launch Alliance workers with mem- bers of the 5th Space Launch Squadron and mission assurance technicians who minimize the risk and make sure everything is done safely and efficiently as possible with eyes on everything. They’ve got it down to a fine art.” make well-informed decisions for troops on the ground. Once a new satellite is built by contractors and ready to be taken into space, members of the 45th SW use Delta and Atlas rockets to get them into orbit. Above the Earth, these satellites provide everything a warfighter needs to have the advantage on the battlefield. “When the troops need information — whether it is commu- nication, intelligence or weather — it is available to them at any time, anywhere,” said Capt. Eric Bogue, a Delta IV lead mis- sion integrator for Geostationary Operational Environmental Operational Satellite launches. ✪ may-June 2009 29