ATK Continues To Motor Along With Orbital Sciences

A healthy $35 million contract has been received by Alliant Techsystems [NYSE:ATK] from Orbital Sciences Corporation to continue providing Orion Motors. ATK also celebrated the delivery of its 100th flight set of Orion rocket motors. The contact includes providing Orion solid rocket motors in support of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and Air Force through 2010. The motors range from 38 to 50 inches in diameter and four to 33 feel in lengthy. They are used to boost multiple stages of a variety of launch vehicles that include Orbital’s Pegasus and Taurus—the Minotaur I space launch vehicle for Orbital and the U.S. Department of Defense—and the Orbital Boost Vehicle (OBV) for MDA’s Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) program. Orion motors were first used in 1990 on the Pegasus launch vehicle. Over the past 17 years, the motors have a 100 percent success rate. All four stages of the Taurus and Taurus XL launch vehicles used the ATK Orion and Castor 120 motors—Edna, Minnesota