The National Reconnaissance Office has confirmed that it will begin payloads on the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral later this month, a mission on SpaceX’s schedule that was not made public recently.
Regulatory filings at the Federal Communications Commission recently revealed plans to launch SpaceX from Cape Canaveral on October 25th. But the details of the mission in the filing do not match any known launches on SpaceX’s schedule, leading to speculation that the launch could carry one. U.S. National security payload for government.
SpaceX has launched a national security mission before the final phase of launch preparations is announced. The Zuma Mission, a mysterious payload launched for the U.S. government in January 2018, was not publicly listed in any launch schedule or contract announcements until the final week of its planned liftoff.
In response to a question from Spaceflight Now, an NRO spokesperson confirmed Monday that it is a customer for the Falcon 9 launch. Not before 25 Oct October.
N.R.O. U.S. The government owns a fleet of intelligence-gathering satellites, providing images, providing intelligence and other data.
Following its typical policy for public announcements, the NRO has not released any information about payloads on Falcon 9 flights later this month. But the NRO and the U.S. Military officers usually announce the existence of most NRO missions many years ahead of time.
The Falcon 9 mission has been assigned to NROL-108, and will begin at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, an NRO spokesman said.
The NRO said in 2018 that the Zuma mission, which failed soon after launch, was not related to the agency. If so, it probably doesn’t look like the NROL-108 mission is a replacement for Zuma, despite the similarities between the missions that were announced.
Information revealed in SpaceX’s FCC filing, which seeks authority to operate radio transmitters for the mission, suggests that the first phase of the Falcon 9 will return to Cape Canaveral after a liftoff for a touchdown on booster landing zone 1.
At several SpaceX launches, the Falcon 9 booster landed on the drone ship, which was located several hundred miles away. In the first stage the drone does not need to reserve as much propellant for landing on the ship, but it is necessary to arrange more fuel to reverse it and return to the landing near the launch site.
Booster’s plans to land at Cape Canaveral for the NROL-108 mission indicate that it is preparing to adjust its payload to low or high orbit, or that the satellite (or satellites) will be relatively non-board relatively light.
The NROL-108 launch is one of three missions for the National Reconnaissance Office fee that could explode from Cape Canaveral this month.
Awaiting a classified payload liftoff on the United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy from Pad 37B on Florida Spaceport. That mission, codenamed NROL-44, was supposed to launch at the end of August Gust, but has been plagued by a series of problems with the launch pad devices.
The most recent attempt was made on Sept. 30, seven seconds before the lift before the abortion began by the TomTown countdown sequencer. ULA has not announced a new target launch date.
Meanwhile, ULA teams on the Pad 41 are preparing to launch the Atlas 5 rocket later this month with the NROL-101 mission, which is set to launch another classified NRO spy satellite.
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