Latest news with #GPSIII-7
Yahoo
02-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
321 Launch: Space news you may have missed over the past week (June 2)
A SpaceX rocket will take to the Florida sky Wednesday morning. As of Tuesday afternoon, SpaceX has officially confirmed the next rocket launch is set for 9:30 a.m. on May 28 from Kennedy Space Center Pad 39A. Read the full story here. Launch recap: Scroll down to read updates from the SpaceX launch of Starlink satellites at 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, May 28 from Kennedy Space Center Pad 39A. Read the full story here. After major setbacks during the past two Starship flights, SpaceX was counting on success this time as it launched the massive Starship on its ninth test flight from Texas — however the May 27 launch saw yet another dramatic ending. From launch to loss of the ship, high-quality footage was sent to the live coverage via Starlink. The world watched as once again things did not go as hoped for the massive launch system, which will eventually launch from Florida. The May 27 flight was aimed at testing much more than what transpired. Read the full story here. A SpaceX rocket took to the Florida sky during the bright, early hours of Wednesday, May 28. The Space Force's 45th Weather Squadron predicted an 85% chance of favorable weather during the early window, and just as predicted, skies were clear and a heat index of 91 degrees was felt. Read the full story here. Space Florida has authorized leasing 25 acres on northern Merritt Island for Project Beep, an undisclosed aerospace company that plans to build a future quarter-billion-dollar facility and create about 1,000 jobs just outside NASA's Kennedy Space Center. Little information has been publicly released about this confidential company. Read the full story here. Look for a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket to propel a GPS III satellite into orbit for the Space Force during an afternoon launch Friday, May 30, from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The Falcon 9 will lift off with the Lockheed Martin-designed and -built satellite at 1:37 p.m. for this GPS III-7 mission, SpaceX announced. The launch window will expire one minute later. Read the full story here. As Florida leaders call for moving the nation's space-agency headquarters to Brevard County, Space Florida is launching a study about how NASA and U.S. Space Force operations could be merged at Cape Canaveral. Space Florida President and CEO Robert Long on Wednesday told board members of the state aerospace agency that a 'unified model' would support the ongoing growth of commercial space operations and ensure government missions can be more efficient and sustainable. Read the full story here. Launch recap: Scroll down to review live updates from the Friday, May 30, liftoff of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral on the GPS III-7 mission for the Space Force. Read the full story here. Dodging raindrops, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket bolted off the pad on a Space Force mission Friday, May 30, shortly after a wave of thunderstorms and showers soaked Cape Canaveral and surrounding areas. The rocket deployed a GPS III satellite into medium-Earth orbit after the 1:37 p.m. liftoff from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station — where a special marine warning had advised boaters of steep waves, gusty winds and possible hail offshore. Read the full story here. Two veteran astronauts were inducted May 31 into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame — and one of them had to miss the induction ceremony as she's preparing to launch on yet another mission. Organized by the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation, the annual ceremony was held under Space Shuttle Atlantis at Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. The new inductees are Bernard Harris and Peggy Whitson, bringing the total number of astronauts in the Hall of Fame to 111. Read the full story here. With the new NASA budget proposal that includes deep cuts heading to Congress and NASA still without a leader, a surprise twist came May 31: Jared Isaacman was being dropped as President Trump's choice to become the next NASA administrator. Isaacman's confirmation as the head of NASA had been expected Monday. But instead the White House announced Isaacman was no longer in the running. Trump said on Truth Social that he will propose a new nominee. Read the full story here. Scrub recap: Scroll down to read updates from the scrubbed SpaceX Starlink 12-19 mission, which was set to liftoff early June 2. The next launch attempt is no earlier than 12:42 a.m. on June 3. Read the full story here. For the latest news from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and NASA's Kennedy Space Center, visit Another easy way: Click here to sign up for our weekly Space newsletter. Rick Neale is a Space Reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Neale at Rneale@ Twitter/X: @RickNeale1 Space is important to us and that's why we're working to bring you top coverage of the industry and Florida launches. Journalism like this takes time and resources. Please support it with a subscription here. This article originally appeared on Florida Today: 321 Launch: Space news you may have missed over the past week (June 2)
Yahoo
31-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
SpaceX knocks out another national security launch while ULA faces scrutiny
ORLANDO, Fla. — United Launch Alliance's years-long delays with its new Vulcan rocket have flipped the script for national security missions, making SpaceX the new reliable provider. The shift to Elon Musk's company at the detriment to ULA's bottom line took center stage again Friday with a SpaceX Falcon 9 launching the GPS III-7 mission from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 40 at 1:37 p.m. The first-stage booster flew for the fourth time making a recovery landing downrange on the droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas stationed in the Atlantic. The mission to launch a GPS satellite was the second originally awarded to ULA but transferred to SpaceX under the National Security Space Launch Phase 2 contract. Initially assigned to ULA's Vulcan, both a December 2024 launch and then Friday's launch were shifted to Falcon 9 as ULA faced an extended delay in certification of its replacement for both its Atlas V and Delta IV class of rockets. While called the GPS III-7 mission, it's actually the eighth of 10 satellites constructed by Lockheed Martin to add to the U.S.'s GPS capability in space. It's also part of an accelerated mission timeline laid out by the Space Force for national security missions in which payloads get to space in under three months from the decision to go, compared to the normal turnaround that can take up to 24 months. 'It highlights another instance of the Space Force's ability to complete high priority launches on a rapid timescale, which demonstrates the capability to respond to emergent constellation needs as rapidly as space vehicle readiness allows,' said Space Force Col. Jim Horne, senior materiel leader of launch execution with the Assured Access to Space program. The latest GPS satellites are three times more accurate and eight times more resistant to jamming than the other 38 in space already, according to the Space Force. The Department of Defense's desire to launch more effective GPS hardware, less susceptible to interference, forced the switch to SpaceX in both missions. The NSSL Phase 2 contract, which featured five years' worth of task orders announced from 2020-2024, was originally announced to give ULA 60% of the assignments. All of those were supposed to fly on Vulcan, with its first launches to be completed by summer 2022. But as Vulcan faced myriad delays, the final spate of task orders ended up putting 26 missions on ULA's plate to SpaceX's 22. Now another two of those missions have swapped from ULA to SpaceX, although the Space Force has said ULA will get back two future missions previously assigned to SpaceX. To date, ULA has only managed to fly one of those 26 missions, and that wasn't on a Vulcan. Instead ULA was forced to use one of its few remaining Atlas V rockets, which flew last summer. ULA, which is a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin that formed in 2006, had originally been targeting mid-2020 for Vulcan's debut. But it faced hurdles from COVID, acquisition of engines from supplier Blue Origin, delays from customer payloads and even a fiery test stand incident that all contributed to a nearly four-year slide. It flew for the first time in January 2024, but not again until that October, both as part of ULA's efforts to get national security certification. An issue with a solid rocket booster motor detaching during launch on the second flight, though, delayed that certification until March 2025. At this point, the first national security launch on Vulcan won't be until at least July, according to Major Gen. Stephen G. Purdy, the acting assistant secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration. Purdy, a former head of Space Launch Delta 45 based at Patrick Space Force Base, raised concerns about ULA's delays during written testimony released earlier this month to the U.S. House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Strategic Forces. 'In NSSL Phase 2, the ULA Vulcan program has performed unsatisfactorily this past year,' he wrote. 'Major issues with the Vulcan have overshadowed its successful certification resulting in delays to the launch of four national security missions. Despite the retirement of highly successful Atlas and Delta launch vehicles, the transition to Vulcan has been slow and continues to impact the completion of Space Force mission objectives.' Vulcan's certification is at the point only partial, having only been signed off for five of the Space Force's nine required orbital needs, Purdy said. He did said ULA has increased its 'engineering resources and management focus to resolve design issues' while government personnel have been more involved with both technical and program management. Purdy said ULA's first national security launch on Vulcan will be USSF-106. The payload, Navigation Technology Satellite-3, is headed to geostationary orbit. Built by L3Harris, it's funded by the Air Force Research Laboratory and a potential replacement technology for GPS. It was one of two task orders given to ULA in 2020 with a value of $337 million. The other, USSF-51, was the one that launched last summer on an Atlas V. With ULA dealing with a backlog of the Phase 2 contract missions, the company's piece of the next pie got smaller. Earlier this year, the Space Force announced SpaceX, not ULA, would get the majority of the Phase 3 contracts with a total of $13.7 billion to be doled out over the next five years. SpaceX would receive 28 of 54 planned missions, or 52%. Meanwhile, ULA's take is only 19 missions, or 35%, while newcomer Blue Origin would get seven, or 13%. Purdy confirmed ULA had already lost out on some Phase 3 contracts because of the Vulcan delays, and addressed what he deemed to be ULA's marching orders along with other commercial providers that have fallen short on delivery to the government. 'For these programs, the prime contractors must re-establish baselines, establish a culture of accountability, and repair trust deficit to prove to (me) that they are adopting the acquisition principles necessary to deliver capabilities at speed, on cost and on schedule,' he said ULA meanwhile is dipping its toes back into launches, lining up only its second planned mission of the year, a commercial launch for customer Amazon using another of its remaining Atlas V rockets. Following the April launch of the first mission for Amazon's Project Kuiper, an internet satellite constellation that aims to compete with SpaceX's Starlink system, the second mission is targeting liftoff no earlier than June 13. Meanwhile, SpaceX has now flown its Falcon 9 on 65 missions this year, including 44 from the Space Coast. ------------
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
SpaceX set to launch GPS satellite from Florida's Space Coast, weather permitting
SpaceX crews are preparing for a Falcon 9 rocket launch on Friday from Florida's Space Coast. SpaceX is targeting 1:23 p.m. for the launch of a next-generation GPS satellite. Officials said GPS III-7 is designed to enhance the accuracy and security of the Global Positioning System that powers everything from smartphones to military systems. The GPS III-7 satellite, part of the U.S. Space Force's modernization efforts, will be delivered to orbit where it will join a constellation of satellites. This mission continues SpaceX's rapid-fire launch cadence. This will be the 5th rocket launch for SpaceX this week, including three Starlink launches and the 9th test flight of its Starship mega rocket. SpaceX is also continuing to focus on its cost-saving reusable rockets. The first-stage booster for this launch has already flow for three other missions, including CRS-32, NROL-69, and a Starlink deployment. After the launch, SpaceX will one again attempt to launch the first-sage booster on its droneship, 'A Shortfall of Gravitas,' in the Atlantic Ocean. Click here to download our free news, weather and smart TV apps. And click here to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.
Miami Herald
30-05-2025
- Science
- Miami Herald
SpaceX scoops up another national security launch while ULA faces scrutiny
United Launch Alliance's years-long delays with its new Vulcan rocket have flipped the script for national security missions, making SpaceX the new reliable provider. The shift to Elon Musk's company at the detriment to ULA's bottom line is on the pad again Friday with a SpaceX Falcon 9 set to launch the GPS III-7 mission from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 40 during a window from 1:23-1:38 p.m., with a backup date on Saturday from 1:18-1:34 p.m. Space Launch Delta 45's weather squadron forecasts only a 45% chance for good conditions Friday, which only improves to 50% on Saturday. The mission to launch a GPS satellite is the second that was originally awarded to ULA but transferred to SpaceX under the National Security Space Launch Phase 2 contract. Originally assigned to ULA's Vulcan, both a December 2024 launch and now this one were shifted to Falcon 9 as ULA faced an extended delay in certification of its replacement for both its Atlas V and Delta IV class of rockets. While called the GPS III-7 mission, it's actually flying the eighth of 10 satellites constructed by Lockheed Martin to add to the U.S.'s GPS capability in space. It's also part of an accelerated mission timeline laid out by the Space Force for national security missions in which payloads get to space in under three months from the decision to go, compared to the normal turnaround that can take up to 24 months. "It highlights another instance of the Space Force's ability to complete high priority launches on a rapid timescale, which demonstrates the capability to respond to emergent constellation needs as rapidly as space vehicle readiness allows," said Space Force Col. Jim Horne, senior materiel leader of launch execution with the Assured Access to Space program. The latest GPS satellites are three times more accurate and eight times more resistant to jamming than the other 38 in space already, according to the Space Force. The Department of Defense's desire to launch more effective GPS hardware, less susceptible to interference, forced the switch to SpaceX in both missions. The NSSL Phase 2 contract, which featured five years' worth of task orders announced from 2020-2024, was originally announced to give ULA 60% of the assignments. All of those were supposed to fly on Vulcan, with its first launches to be completed by summer 2022. But as Vulcan faced myriad delays, the final spate of task orders ended up putting 26 missions on ULA's plate to SpaceX's 22. Now another two of those missions have swapped from ULA to SpaceX, although the Space Force has said ULA will get back two future missions previously assigned to SpaceX. To date, ULA has only managed to fly one of those 26 missions, and that wasn't on a Vulcan. Instead ULA was forced to use one of its few remaining Atlas V rockets, which flew last summer. ULA, which is a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin that formed in 2006, had originally been targeting mid-2020 for Vulcan's debut. But it faced hurdles from COVID, acquisition of engines from supplier Blue Origin, delays from customer payloads and even a fiery test stand incident that all contributed to a nearly four-year slide. It flew for the first time in January 2024, but not again until that October, both as part of ULA's efforts to get national security certification. An issue with a solid rocket booster motor detaching during launch on the second flight, though, delayed that certification until March 2025. At this point, the first national security launch on Vulcan won't be until at least July, according to Major Gen. Stephen G. Purdy, the acting assistant secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration. Purdy, a former head of Space Launch Delta 45 based at Patrick Space Force Base, raised concerns about ULA's delays during written testimony released earlier this month to the U.S. House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Strategic Forces. "In NSSL Phase 2, the ULA Vulcan program has performed unsatisfactorily this past year," he wrote. "Major issues with the Vulcan have overshadowed its successful certification resulting in delays to the launch of four national security missions. Despite the retirement of highly successful Atlas and Delta launch vehicles, the transition to Vulcan has been slow and continues to impact the completion of Space Force mission objectives." Vulcan's certification is at the point only partial, having only been signed off for five of the Space Force's nine required orbital needs, Purdy said. He did said ULA has increased its "engineering resources and management focus to resolve design issues" while government personnel have been more involved with both technical and program management. Purdy said ULA's first national security launch on Vulcan will be USSF-106. The payload, Navigation Technology Satellite-3, is headed to geostationary orbit. Built by L3Harris, it's funded by the Air Force Research Laboratory and a potential replacement technology for GPS. It was one of two task orders given to ULA in 2020 with a value of $337 million. The other, USSF-51, was the one that launched last summer on an Atlas V. With ULA dealing with a backlog of the Phase 2 contract missions, the company's piece of the next pie got smaller. Earlier this year, the Space Force announced SpaceX, not ULA, would get the majority of the Phase 3 contracts with a total of $13.7 billion to be doled out over the next five years. SpaceX would receive 28 of 54 planned missions, or 52%. Meanwhile, ULA's take is only 19 missions, or 35%, while newcomer Blue Origin would get seven, or 13%. Purdy confirmed ULA had already lost out on some Phase 3 contracts because of the Vulcan delays, and addressed what he deemed to be ULA's marching orders along with other commercial providers that have fallen short on delivery to the government. "For these programs, the prime contractors must re-establish baselines, establish a culture of accountability, and repair trust deficit to prove to (me) that they are adopting the acquisition principles necessary to deliver capabilities at speed, on cost and on schedule," he said. ULA meanwhile is dipping its toes back into launches, lining up only its second planned mission of the year, a commercial launch for customer Amazon using another of its remaining Atlas V rockets. Following the April launch of the first mission for Amazon's Project Kuiper, an internet satellite constellation that aims to compete with SpaceX's Starlink system, the second mission is targeting liftoff no earlier than June 13. Meanwhile, SpaceX has already flown its Falcon 9 on 64 missions this year, including 43 from the Space Coast. ------------- Copyright (C) 2025, Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Portions copyrighted by the respective providers.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
SpaceX scoops up another national security launch while ULA faces scrutiny
United Launch Alliance's years-long delays with its new Vulcan rocket have flipped the script for national security missions, making SpaceX the new reliable provider. The shift to Elon Musk's company at the detriment to ULA's bottom line is on the pad again Friday with a SpaceX Falcon 9 set to launch the GPS III-7 mission from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 40 during a window from 1:23-1:38 p.m., with a backup date on Saturday from 1:18-1:34 p.m. Space Launch Delta 45's weather squadron forecasts only a 45% chance for good conditions Friday, which only improves to 50% on Saturday. The mission to launch a GPS satellite is the second that was originally awarded to ULA but transferred to SpaceX under the National Security Space Launch Phase 2 contract. Originally assigned to ULA's Vulcan, both a December 2024 launch and now this one were shifted to Falcon 9 as ULA faced an extended delay in certification of its replacement for both its Atlas V and Delta IV class of rockets. While called the GPS III-7 mission, it's actually flying the eighth of 10 satellites constructed by Lockheed Martin to add to the U.S.'s GPS capability in space. It's also part of an accelerated mission timeline laid out by the Space Force for national security missions in which payloads get to space in under three months from the decision to go, compared to the normal turnaround that can take up to 24 months. 'It highlights another instance of the Space Force's ability to complete high priority launches on a rapid timescale, which demonstrates the capability to respond to emergent constellation needs as rapidly as space vehicle readiness allows,' said Space Force Col. Jim Horne, senior materiel leader of launch execution with the Assured Access to Space program. The latest GPS satellites are three times more accurate and eight times more resistant to jamming than the other 38 in space already, according to the Space Force. The Department of Defense's desire to launch more effective GPS hardware, less susceptible to interference, forced the switch to SpaceX in both missions. The NSSL Phase 2 contract, which featured five years' worth of task orders announced from 2020-2024, was originally announced to give ULA 60% of the assignments. All of those were supposed to fly on Vulcan, with its first launches to be completed by summer 2022. Northrop Grumman doubles down on new rocket investment with Firefly Astronomers discover strange new celestial object in our Milky Way galaxy SpaceX gets back to work with Falcon 9 launch from KSC Space Coast launch schedule Get ready for several years of killer heat, top weather forecasters warn But as Vulcan faced myriad delays, the final spate of task orders ended up putting 26 missions on ULA's plate to SpaceX's 22. Now another two of those missions have swapped from ULA to SpaceX, although the Space Force has said ULA will get back two future missions previously assigned to SpaceX. To date, ULA has only managed to fly one of those 26 missions, and that wasn't on a Vulcan. Instead ULA was forced to use one of its few remaining Atlas V rockets, which flew last summer. ULA, which is a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin that formed in 2006, had originally been targeting mid-2020 for Vulcan's debut. But it faced hurdles from COVID, acquisition of engines from supplier Blue Origin, delays from customer payloads and even a fiery test stand incident that all contributed to a nearly four-year slide. It flew for the first time in January 2024, but not again until that October, both as part of ULA's efforts to get national security certification. An issue with a solid rocket booster motor detaching during launch on the second flight, though, delayed that certification until March 2025. At this point, the first national security launch on Vulcan won't be until at least July, according to Major Gen. Stephen G. Purdy, the acting assistant secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration. Purdy, a former head of Space Launch Delta 45 based at Patrick Space Force Base, raised concerns about ULA's delays during written testimony released earlier this month to the U.S. House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Strategic Forces. 'In NSSL Phase 2, the ULA Vulcan program has performed unsatisfactorily this past year,' he wrote. 'Major issues with the Vulcan have overshadowed its successful certification resulting in delays to the launch of four national security missions. Despite the retirement of highly successful Atlas and Delta launch vehicles, the transition to Vulcan has been slow and continues to impact the completion of Space Force mission objectives.' Vulcan's certification is at the point only partial, having only been signed off for five of the Space Force's nine required orbital needs, Purdy said. He did said ULA has increased its 'engineering resources and management focus to resolve design issues' while government personnel have been more involved with both technical and program management. Purdy said ULA's first national security launch on Vulcan will be USSF-106. The payload, Navigation Technology Satellite-3, is headed to geostationary orbit. Built by L3Harris, it's funded by the Air Force Research Laboratory and a potential replacement technology for GPS. It was one of two task orders given to ULA in 2020 with a value of $337 million. The other, USSF-51, was the one that launched last summer on an Atlas V. With ULA dealing with a backlog of the Phase 2 contract missions, the company's piece of the next pie got smaller. Earlier this year, the Space Force announced SpaceX, not ULA, would get the majority of the Phase 3 contracts with a total of $13.7 billion to be doled out over the next five years. SpaceX would receive 28 of 54 planned missions, or 52%. Meanwhile, ULA's take is only 19 missions, or 35%, while newcomer Blue Origin would get seven, or 13%. Purdy confirmed ULA had already lost out on some Phase 3 contracts because of the Vulcan delays, and addressed what he deemed to be ULA's marching orders along with other commercial providers that have fallen short on delivery to the government. 'For these programs, the prime contractors must re-establish baselines, establish a culture of accountability, and repair trust deficit to prove to (me) that they are adopting the acquisition principles necessary to deliver capabilities at speed, on cost and on schedule,' he said ULA meanwhile is dipping its toes back into launches, lining up only its second planned mission of the year, a commercial launch for customer Amazon using another of its remaining Atlas V rockets. Following the April launch of the first mission for Amazon's Project Kuiper, an internet satellite constellation that aims to compete with SpaceX's Starlink system, the second mission is targeting liftoff no earlier than June 13. Meanwhile, SpaceX has already flown its Falcon 9 on 64 missions this year, including 43 from the Space Coast.
