V-2 sounding rocket

German V-2 rockets captured by the United States Army at the end of World War II were used as sounding rockets to carry scientific instruments into the Earth's upper atmosphere at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) for a program of atmospheric and solar investigation through the late 1940s. Rocket trajectory was intended to carry the rocket about high and horizontally from WSMR Launch Complex 33. Impact velocity of returning rockets was reduced by inducing structural failure of the rocket airframe upon atmospheric re-entry. More durable recordings and instruments might be recovered from the rockets after ground impact, but telemetry was developed to transmit and record instrument readings during flight. The first of 300 railroad cars of V-2 rocket components began to arrive at Las Cruces, New Mexico in July 1945 for transfer to WSMR. So much equipment was taken from Germany that the Deutsches Museum later had to obtain a V-2 for an exhibit from the US. In November General Electric (GE) employees began to identify, sort, and reassemble V-2 rocket components in WSMR Building 1538, designated as WSMR Assembly Building 1. The Army completed a blockhouse in WSMR Launch Area 1 in September 1945. WSMR Launch Complex 33 for the captured V-2s was built around this blockhouse. Initial V-2 assembly efforts produced 25 rockets available for launch. The Army assembled an Upper Atmosphere Research Panel of representative from the Air Materiel Command, Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), Army Signal Corps, Ballistic Research Laboratory, Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Michigan, Harvard University, Princeton University, and General Electric Company. German rocket scientists of Operation Paperclip arrived at Fort Bliss in January 1946 to assist the V-2 rocket testing program. After a static test firing of a V-2 engine on 15 March 1946, the first V-2 rocket launch from Launch Complex 33 was on 16 April 1946.