A tiny spacecraft orbiting Earth appeared to
successfully unfurl a solar sail Tuesday to test the
potential of using only sunlight for propulsion,
mission officials said.
Deployment commands were sent to the
Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 from mission
control at California Polytechnic State University,
San Luis Obispo.
“Sail deployment appears to have been
very successful,” said Bruce Betts, LightSail
program manager and chief scientist at the
Planetary Society.
Photos to be transmitted later were expected to
confirm data received from the spacecraft that
included a count of the number of turns by a
deployment motor.