United Launch Alliance – Page 23

ULA plans to ring in the weekend with Friday evening launch

March 13, 2019 Stephen Clark

United Launch Alliance ground crews are putting the final touches on a Delta 4 rocket scheduled for blastoff Friday evening from Cape Canaveral with a U.S. Air Force communications satellite.

Facing more delays, NASA opens door to launching lunar mission with commercial rockets

March 13, 2019 Stephen Clark

In a major shift, NASA is considering using two commercial launchers to send an unpiloted Orion crew capsule and its European-built service module on a test flight around the moon next year, maintaining the lunar test flight’s schedule despite fresh delays in the development of the multibillion-dollar Space Launch System that jeopardize the heavy-lifter’s 2020 inaugural flight, the agency’s administrator said in a congressional hearing Wednesday.

SpaceX, ULA win military contracts, Air Force renames EELV program

March 7, 2019 Stephen Clark

United Launch Alliance and SpaceX recently won contracts worth $739 million to send six missions into orbit for the U.S. military, and the Air Force has announced a new title for its flagship launcher program, dropping “expendable” from the name in a new era of reusable rockets.

Military satellite joined with Delta 4 rocket at Cape Canaveral

March 2, 2019 Stephen Clark

The addition of a U.S. Air Force communications satellite has capped the assembly of a 218-foot-tall United Launch Alliance Delta 4 rocket at Cape Canaveral set for liftoff the evening of March 13.

SpaceX files protest of NASA’s Lucy launch contract awarded to ULA

February 15, 2019 Stephen Clark

SpaceX has filed a protest challenging a nearly $150 million NASA contract awarded to United Launch Alliance last month to send a robotic asteroid probe into space.

First unpiloted test flight of SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule reset for March 2

February 6, 2019 William Harwood

As expected, NASA announced Wednesday that the first unpiloted test flight of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and a Crew Dragon astronaut ferry ship has slipped from later this month to March 2. The first unpiloted flight of Boeing’s Starliner capsule is now targeted for the April timeframe.

ULA wins contract to launch NASA’s Lucy mission to visit unexplored asteroids

February 1, 2019 Stephen Clark

NASA has selected United Launch Alliance’s Atlas 5 rocket to dispatch the Lucy spacecraft on a mission from Cape Canaveral in October 2021 to fly by seven unexplored asteroids, including six objects locked in orbits leading and trailing Jupiter, where scientists expect swarms of miniature worlds could hold clues about the formation of the solar system.

Photos: Delta 4-Heavy blasts off from Vandenberg

January 26, 2019 Stephen Clark

The first of up to seven United Launch Alliance missions lifted off Jan. 19 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, where a Delta 4-Heavy launcher fired into orbit with 2.1 million pounds of thrust from three hydrogen-fueled RS-68A main engines with a U.S. government spy satellite.

Boe pulled from commercial crew test flight due to medical issue

January 22, 2019 William Harwood

Eric Boe, one of three astronauts assigned to the first piloted test flight of a Boeing CST-100 Starliner commercial crew ship later this year has been removed from the mission due to unspecified medical issues, NASA announced Tuesday. He will be replaced by veteran astronaut Mike Fincke.

Delta 4-Heavy rocket launches U.S. spy satellite into unusual orbit

January 19, 2019 Stephen Clark

A top secret surveillance payload owned by the National Reconnaissance Office soared into space Saturday from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on top of a United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket, entering an unusual orbit not previously used by the U.S. government’s spy satellite fleet.