watchmen" that contained a description of the project history focusing on the contributions made at Los Alamos National Laboratory, as well as commentary from scientists that worked on the project. In the article astrophysicist Ed Fenimore states “Vela was the prototypical project that made Los Alamos the premier scientific national security laboratory in the world.” Data from Project Vela is still used for national security work, and sensors, such as those developed in the project, are still an important part of nuclear detonation detection. Vela Hotel and the Initial Vela Project There is very little documentation which directly addresses the topic of the initial Vela Project due to its low funding, staffing, resources and status of priority. The first sensor package sent into space, labelled the "Vela Hotel" experiment, was launched aboard the Ranger 1 lunar probe in August of 1961 and returned useful data. It is known that the majority of the work done on the initial Vela Project was implemented into Vela Hotel, which monitored outer space for nuclear tests. The Vela Hotel satellite program was primarily developed at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, under the supervision of the United States Air Force. A system of X-ray, Neutron, and Gamma-Ray detection monitored for nuclear testing beyond the atmosphere. The satellites' instrumentation count included 12 X-ray detectors, 18 internal Neutron and Gamma-ray detectors, data transmission equipment to send the information back to Earth, and a set of Solar Panels which generated 90 watts to power the instrumentation on each satellite. Six of the Vela Hotel series satellites were manufactured, each with a design life of six months, and they were launched a week after the PTB Treaty on October 17, 1963. After deployment these satellites remained operational and online for 5 years before being shut down. The Vela Hotel series of satellites never detected any weapons being tested in outer space, but they did provide the scientific community with valuable data regarding the mechanics of the solar system. Importantly, this series of satellites was responsible for discovering Gamma-Ray Bursts, markers of collapsing stars and black holes which are now recognized as the most violent events in the universe. The discovery of Gamma-Ray Bursts enabled scientists with unprecedented ability to map the universe as they augmented existing methods of measuring light to identify deep space objects. Vela Sierra and the Advanced Vela Series After the completion of development on the first