Status
Success
KH-7 26 (Gambit-1 26) & NRL-PL 137
Fri Mar 18, 1966 20:00 UTC
Rocket
Mission Details
KH-7 26 (Gambit-1 26)
KH-7 (Keyhole 7) managed by NRO's Program A and operated this US Air Force system boasted long focal length cameras capable of identifying and measuring properties of targets such as missiles and aircraft, surpassing the resolution of the CORONA system. The spacecraft, a 3-axis-stabilized satellite separated from the Agena-D, housed the payload, camera system, and reentry vehicle (SRV), known as the OCV (Orbital Control Vehicle), built by General Electric. The KH-7 camera featured a 112 cm diameter primary mirror and achieved ground resolutions ranging from 0.61 m to 0.91 m, utilizing strip exposure techniques for capturing images with a swath width of 22 km and strip lengths of up to 741 km from its 167-kilometer orbit.
NRL-PL 137
NRL-PL 137 was an experiment to study the high frequency radio propagation conducted by the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL).