The four Research Council satellites were named:
The Atlas Computer Laboratory processed data received from both Ariel III and Ariel IV starting with Ariel III, which was launched on 5th May, 1967.
For Ariel III, information was received from the satellite by 16 tracking stations around the world. This information went to space science laboratories for initial clean up. The tapes were then sent to AWRE Aldermaston, where the IBM 7030 (STRETCH) separated the data into the results for individual experiments. These were then sent to the Atlas Computer Laboratory for further processing and the results returned to the scientists on appropriately formatted magnetic tapes.
The nature of the activity as far as Atlas was concerned was a continuous stream of magnetic tapes, at least three per week, which needed to be processed at the rate of about 1 hour processing per tape.
