STORIE – Storm Time O+ Ring current Imaging Evolution

NASA is launching a new experiment to track charged particles in a "space doughnut" that encircles our planet. Installed on the exterior of the International Space Station, the new experiment will study the ring current — a doughnut-shaped swarm of particles that can surge when a solar blast hits Earth, disrupting our satellites in space and power systems on the ground.

NASA’s STORIE (Storm Time O+ Ring current Imaging Evolution) instrument is shown here installed on the Space Test Program – Houston 11 (STP-H11) payload, a partnership between the U.S. Space Force and NASA, at the Space Station Processing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It is covered in blanketing material to protect STORIE from the space environment. After launch, the STP-H11 payload and STORIE will be installed on the outside of the International Space Station’s Columbus module.Learn more: https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/heliophysics/nasas-storie-mission-to-tell-tale-of-earths-ring-current/ ||

NASA’s STORIE mission, or Storm Time O+ Ring current Imaging Evolution, has completed its design, build, and testing campaign at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, ahead of its six-month mission onboard the International Space Station (ISS). From its unique vantage point on the ISS, STORIE will use its onboard neutral atom imager to provide an “inside out” view of Earth’s ring current – a region of the magnetosphere where energetic particles are trapped in near-Earth space. In addition to answering fundamental questions about the ring current’s intensity and composition, STORIE will also provide a more detailed understanding of how geomagnetic storms affect Earth.From NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, STORIE will be shipped to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, where it will be integrated onto a pallet to be installed outside the ISS’s Columbus Module. STORIE will head to the ISS aboard a SpaceX commercial resupply flight no earlier than spring 2026. ||

NASA’s STORIE mission, or Storm Time O+ Ring current Imaging Evolution, has completed its design, build, and testing campaign at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, ahead of its mission onboard the International Space Station (ISS). From its unique vantage point on the ISS, STORIE will use neutral atom imaging to provide an “inside out” view of Earth’s ring current – a region of the magnetosphere where energetic particles are trapped in near-Earth space. In addition to answering fundamental questions about the ring current’s intensity and composition, STORIE will also provide a more detailed understanding of how geomagnetic storms affect Earth.From NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, STORIE will be shipped to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, where it will be integrated onto a pallet to be installed outside the ISS’s Columbus Module. STORIE will head to the ISS aboard a SpaceX commercial resupply flight no earlier than spring 2026. ||