Message posted by Peter Merlin on October 19, 2005 at 18:35:09 PST:
Tony Moore and I went to Vandenberg AFB today for the launch of Titan 4 B-26. Our first stop was Space launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) on vandenberg South Base to watch the rollback of the service stucture. The vehicle was topped with a fairly short payload shroud and had no upper stage. The payload was a classified National Reconaissance Office (NRO) satellite. We then moved back to the viewing site on a ridge about 5 miles from the launch pad on VAFB North Base. The weather was perfect (which is unusual for Vandenberg) and the launch flawless. The Titan series of launch vehicles traces its history back 50 years to the initial contract award in 1955. The first Titan 1 missile launched in 1959. There have been 368 launches of four major Titan variants. This was the 200th Titan launch from Vandenberg and the last for the launch vehicle family. There are no more Titan launch vehicles in the inventory.
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