SpaceXblasts off NASA's new planet-hunter

NASA has blasted off its newest planet-hunting spacecraft, TESS, a $337 million satellite that aims to scan 85 percent of the skies for cosmic bodies where life may exist.

"Three, two, one and liftoff!" said NASA commentator Mike Curie as the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) soared into the cloudless, blue sky atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida at 6:51 pm (2251 GMT).

The washing machine-sized spacecraft is built to search outside the solar system, scanning the nearest, brightest stars for signs of periodic dimming.These so-called "transits" may mean that planets are in orbit around them.

TESS is expected to reveal 20,000 planets beyond our solar system, including more than 50 Earth-sized planets and up to 500 planets less than twice the size of the Earth, NASA



said.

Its discoveries will be studied further by ground- and space-based telescopes for signs of habitability, including a rocky terrain, a size similar to Earth and a distance from their sun -- neither too close nor too far -- that allows the right temperature for liquid water.

"The stories of these planets will continue on, long after their detection," Martin Still, TESS program scientist, said on Wednesday.

"It was incredible. It was so emotional," said Natalia Guerrero, a TESS researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in an interview on NASA TV after the launch.

She was part of a team that built four cameras that serve as the spacecraft's eyes.

"TESS's four cameras are tiny but mighty," she said.