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Yahoo
21-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Elon Musk's SpaceX will help Amazon launch competitor Kuiper satellites: Here's why
Amazon's internet-beaming Kuiper satellites could one day be a formative challenge to the Starlink constellation SpaceX has spent years amassing. So, why is SpaceX, the commercial spaceflight company tech mogul Elon Musk founded in 2002, helping Amazon get the satellites into orbit? The next batch of Kuiper satellites are set to hitch a ride into outer space atop SpaceX's famous two-stage Falcon 9 rocket. Amid a brewing billionaire satellite battle between Musk and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the collaboration may seem unexpected. But there is a perfectly logical explanation for the partnership: Amazon is paying good money to SpaceX for the lift. SpaceX's services come after the United Launch Alliance's mighty Atlas V rocket delivered the first two rounds of Project Kuiper satellites into orbit following liftoff from Florida. Here's what to know about the third-ever Kuiper satellite delivery mission – the first using a SpaceX vehicle. What is Project Kuiper? What to know about Amazon satellites launching from Florida When is the next Amazon satellite rocket launch? Amazon is planning to deploy another 24 Kuiper satellites into orbit as early as Wednesday, July 16, from Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The mission is named KF-01 because it is the first Kuiper launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 – one of the world's most active rockets. As of Tuesday, July 15, a 27-minute launch window was scheduled to open at 2:18 a.m. ET Wednesday, July 16. If needed, a backup launch opportunity is available at 1:57 a.m. ET Thursday, July 17, according to SpaceX. Once SpaceX's Falcon 9 deploys the satellites at 289 miles above Earth, Amazon's Project Kuiper team will take control from an operations center in Redmond, Washington, and raise them to an altitude of about 391 miles, according to Amazon. A successful delivery would bring the number of Kuiper satellites deployed to low-Earth orbit to 78. Why is SpaceX launching Amazon satellites into orbit? SpaceX is one of multiple companies Amazon has contracted to serve as a launch service provider on its Kuiper deployments. For instance, the United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, delivered the first 54 Kuiper satellites into low-Earth orbit across two launches on its Atlas V rocket. A total of 80 Kuiper launches are anticipated in the years ahead, the majority of which will use the ULA's Atlas V and Vulcan Centaur rockets. Eventually, Amazon will make use of the massive New Glenn rocket for Kuiper deliveries. The 320-foot spacecraft is being developed and operated by Blue Origin, the spaceflight company that Bezos also owns. Amazon is also planning to contract with European launch services provider Arianespace. What is Project Kuiper? Amazon's Project Kuiper intends to one day provide high-speed internet to customers around the world. To achieve that goal, the company has begun building a constellation of satellites linked to a global network of antennas, fiber and internet connection points on the ground. Amazon has touted the service as one that will benefit "unserved and underserved communities" in rural areas where internet access may be elusive. Project Kuiper is a subsidiary of Amazon, the online commerce behemoth that billionaire Bezos founded in 1994. An estimated $10 billion Amazon initiative, Project Kuiper includes a $140 million, 100,000-square-foot processing plant at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida that will prep Project Kuiper's satellites for launch from Cape Canaveral. Amazon estimates that Project Kuiper could begin delivering service to customers by late 2025, though it will take years for all 3,232 first-generation satellites to be deployed and operational in low-Earth orbit. Billionaire vs. billionare: Jeff Bezos competes with Elon Musk's Starlink The venture is meant to challenge Starlink, an internet satellite constellation service that billionaire Elon Musk has been building for about six years. SpaceX, which Musk founded in 2002, has launched more than 7,000 operational Starlink satellites into orbit since 2019 from both Florida and Vandenberg Space Force Base in Southern California. In 2025, the Federal Aviation Administration, which licenses commercial rocket launches, gave SpaceX the greenlight to increase its Falcon 9 rocket launches from 36 per year to 50. Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at elagatta@ This article originally appeared on Florida Today: SpaceX to help Amazon launch Kuiper satellites, competitor to Starlink
Yahoo
18-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
What to know: ULA Vulcan rocket to launch national security mission from Cape Canaveral
It's been awhile since Florida has seen a Vulcan rocket launch, but United Launch Alliance is pushing ahead to break that drought. While an official launch date is yet to come, ULA has announced the upcoming USSF-106 mission for the Space Force. The company has also teased photos of the red and white Vulcan rocket in the process of being stacked for launch. The long awaited liftoff will be from Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. As it is a national security mission, the payload remains undisclosed. When did a Vulcan last launch? How long has it been since we've seen this rocket? The last Vulcan launch was the Space Force certification flight in October 2024. Now that the new rocket has been cleared to fly national security payloads, the Space Coast awaits a launch date for this rocket's third flight. "From its inception, the Vulcan rocket was designed to deliver heavy payloads to any orbit. The upcoming USSF-106 mission utilizes this capability with Centaur V launching a multi-manifest U.S. national security payload directly to geosynchronous orbit for the Space Force," United Launch Alliance posted to its website July 15. The Centaur V is the Vulcan's upper stage, which is designed to reach unusual orbits for these national security missions. "The basic architecture of the rocket is really focused on these unique orbits," ULA CEO Tory Bruno told reporters in March. "An example would be directly injecting into geosynchronous orbit − a mission really the government does." A geosynchronous orbit is one which orbits alongside Earth's 24-hour rotation, with the spacecraft staying above the same longitude. The first time a Vulcan launched was in January 2024. What is the Vulcan replacing? While ULA still launches its Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral, the Vulcan is designed to replace both Atlas V and the now retired Delta IV. It will become ULA's main workhorse rocket. On top of missions for the Space Force, Vulcan will also fly payloads such as Amazon's Kuiper internet satellites. The long awaited Dream Chaser space plane is also on the manifest, but no launch day yet. Vulcan is designed to fly with two, four, or six solid rocket boosters, or none at all. ULA says to look for four solid rocket boosters propelling this upcoming mission off the launch pad. What happened during the ULA Vulcan rocket launch in Florida last fall? During Vulcan's last launch in October 2024, sparks were seen by spectators approximately 38 seconds into the flight. It was later revealed that an issue within one of the solid rocket boosters caused the light show. The issue did not impact the mission, with the payload reaching orbit. The incident was investigated by ULA to understand the root cause. In March 2025, the Vulcan rocket received certification from the U.S. Space Force to fly national security missions. When is the next Florida launch? Is there a launch today? Upcoming SpaceX, NASA, ULA rocket launch schedule at Cape Canaveral Be sure to follow the FLORIDA TODAY Space Team for the latest from Cape Canaveral. Brooke Edwards is a Space Reporter for Florida Today. Contact her at bedwards@ or on X: @brookeofstars. This article originally appeared on Florida Today: What to know: ULA Vulcan rocket to launch mission from Cape Canaveral Solve the daily Crossword
Forbes
17-07-2025
- Business
- Forbes
West Coast Opportunities Await Space Industry Rocket Booster Builders
A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket launches from Vandenberg Space Force Base. America is struggling to keep up with a booming space industry. A particular space challenge is looming in the Pacific, where investments to bolster U.S. space launch infrastructure lag behind Florida's highly-integrated East Coast launch complexes. This East Coast overweighting is a mistake. Too much big-booster production and other key space manufacturing infrastructure is consolidating eastward. But America's Western launch sites are growing in importance, and the lack of space industry investment may strangle opportunities for future growth. The problem is an economic one. The space industry loves the short-term economic stimulus provided by the Southeastern states, but the operational consequences from the over-consolidation of this industry in the Southeast is, for certain space products, quite dire. Take boosters. The wide, tall and heavy rocket boosters of tomorrow are outgrowing America's old-school roads and rail systems. They don't travel well, and that forces America's next-generation orbital rockets into a crippling dependence upon America's fragile, underdeveloped and easily-disrupted maritime transportation network. This, coupled with America's unfortunate defenestration of the West Coast's limited supply of industrial waterfront, means that America's space launch industry is on the verge of trapping itself on the wrong side of the increasingly unreliable Panama Canal. For the U.S. space economy, overbuilding East Coast space launch support infrastructure provides short term gains in exchange for long-term risks. Cape Canaveral is a wonderful facility. But the Pacific offers America and the Space Industry massive and overlooked opportunities. Outside of SpaceX, America's big-booster community has been slow to invest in the West Coast. To grow—and to challenge SpaceX's virtual lock on the West Coast's big-rocket opportunities, California's Vandenberg Space Force Base, Alaska's Pacific Spaceport Complex and other remote-but-ideally-placed launch sites in America's Pacific territories need more West Coast-based booster production and associated support infrastructure. A 212-foot-tall SLS core stage for the Artemis II moon rocket squeezes out of a barge West Coast is the Space Industry's Future: For space flight, western momentum is undeniable. At California's Vandenberg Space Force Base, the Falcon 9-driven launch tempo has increased by a torrid 30% a year. After hosting just four launches in 2012, Vandenberg is challenging Cape Canaveral's blistering launch tempo. Between May 31 and June 28, Vandenberg hosted seven rocket launches to Cape Canaveral's 10. It would only take a strong hurricane for Vandenberg to sneak ahead. Farther north, the remote Pacific Spaceport Complex—becalmed by launch and testing failures—still predicts launch tempo at the Kodiak, Alaska-based facility will, by 2030, increase almost ten-fold. Farther west, additional development beckons the right innovators. Long-abandoned U.S. rocket-launch facilities on Johnston Island, leased facilities on Kwajalein, and other remote places in the deep Pacific offer American space launch programs invaluable launching points near the equator. With open sea to the east, America's island holdings may offer new frontiers for the big and heavy rockets—and the big, heavy payloads—of the future. Right now, the only big-rocket company poised to exploit America's Pacific space launch facilities is SpaceX. Elon Musk—a newly-minted presidential adversary—moved the SpaceX headquarters out of California in a highly-publicized political huff. Despite the well-orchestrated political showmanship, SpaceX has steadily expanded their West Coast footprint, growing a Long Beach port facility—just 30 minutes from a Falcon 9 first stage fabrication plant—so SpaceX employees can recover and refurbish Falcon 9 booster cores faster and, potentially, assemble and ship larger rockets for use elsewhere. Rivals may be hesitant to challenge SpaceX in the Pacific, but, even SpaceX's ideally-built-out 14-acre waterfront facility is no sure thing. Musk's new 'spaceport' is a former Navy base. In essence, SpaceX has effectively appropriated the Long Beach Naval Complex—and all the infrastructure investment the U.S. government made in the facility—for a bargain-basement cost. An irked White House could easily use the burgeoning national security threat in the Pacific as an excuse to recover the entire complex, dashing SpaceX's virtual monopoly on America's Pacific launch infrastructure—a step that would launch a healthy competition as booster manufacturers jostled for a West Coast toehold. Even without White House involvement, additional big booster-building outposts outside of the already-crowded Los Angeles/Long Beach waterfront makes sense. Private industry is paying a lot for launches, offering an opportunity to quickly pay off the capital costs. Space, however, is limited. Only a handful of California harbors can offer the Space industry the right combination of waterfront access and skilled labor within a few hundred miles of Vandenberg's launch pads. Wider geographical distribution of America's booster production and refurbishment sites is a good thing for America's space industry. It is the only way to accelerate an already blistering Pacific launch tempo at Vandenberg, and America's booster rockets, orbital payloads and geospatial stakes are just getting bigger.
Digital Trends
16-07-2025
- Business
- Digital Trends
SpaceX is about to give Starlink's main rival a ride to orbit
SpaceX has been enjoying growing uptake of its internet-from-space Starlink service, but in a weird twist, the company is about to lend a hand to its main rival in the sector. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is about to launch 24 satellites for Amazon's Project Kuiper program, which, like Starlink, will offer internet connectivity to individuals and businesses globally. Recommended Videos The mission is aiming to lift off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 1:57 a.m. ET on Wednesday. A live webcast will begin about 15 minutes before launch, which you can watch on X @SpaceX. Amazon's Project Kuiper is still in its early days, having so far deployed only 54 internet satellites in two missions, the first of which took place in April. SpaceX's Starlink, meanwhile, is much further down the road, with more than 7,000 satellites now serving more than 5 million customers globally following its first deployment in 2019. Amazon used a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket for its first two Project Kuiper satellite launches. But the regulator has insisted that it must have half of its planned 3,200 satellites deployed by the end of July 2026, with the rest facing a July 2029 deadline for deployment. Failure to meet the initial milestone could risk key license permissions, though it's thought that Amazon would probably be granted additional time if needed. The tight deadline has prompted Amazon to tap the services of multiple launch providers, with not only ULA and SpaceX but also Arianespace, and Blue Origin — the company started by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos — likely to send Project Kuiper satellites to orbit over the next 12 months and beyond. The unusual collaboration means that SpaceX is actually helping to accelerate a direct competitor's progress, a move that intensifies the high-stakes race for dominance in the orbital internet sector.
Miami Herald
13-07-2025
- Science
- Miami Herald
Space Coast's 60th launch of year also Falcon 9's 500th successful SpaceX mission
An early Sunday morning SpaceX launch marked the 60th orbital mission from the Space Coast from all companies for the year, but also the 500th successful mission for the workhorse Falcon 9 rocket. The rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 40 at 1:04 a.m. carrying an Israeli communications satellite on the Commercial GTO 1 mission. The first-stage booster flew for the 13th time and made a recovery landing downrange on the droneship Just Read the Instructions. It was the 502nd launch of a Falcon 9 since its debut in 2010, with the company only losing the rocket on two missions - once in 2015 and then in July 2024. The company has also flown its larger Falcon Heavy 11 times since 2018, but not yet so far in 2025. SpaceX has launched all but three of the Space Coast missions in 2025, with Blue Origin's New Glenn making its debut flight in January and United Launch Alliance having flown two Atlas V rockets on missions for Amazon's Project Kuiper in April and June. ULA has its new Vulcan rocket lined up for its first national security launch, the USSF-106 mission for the Space Force, but its launch date has not been announced. Blue Origin this week announced the engines for its next New Glenn rocket are ready, but isn't expected to fly until at least fall. Meanwhile, SpaceX will continue to launch regularly from both Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center. The next KSC launch from SpaceX is the Crew-11 mission to the International Space Station no earlier than July 31. The Commercial Crew Program flight will take up two astronauts from NASA, one for Japan's JAXA and one cosmonaut for Roscosmos to relieve the Crew-10 crew that has been on the station since March. That flight will be the fourth human spaceflight for SpaceX this year including Crew-10 and the private polar orbital Fram2 mission and private Axiom Space Ax-4 mission, whose astronauts are currently on board the station, but scheduled to leave as soon as Monday morning. The Space Coast saw a record 93 launches in 2024 and is on pace to break 100 launches for 2025. SpaceX has flown 85 orbital missions among its Florida and California facilities this year, and is also on track to break its record of 134 missions that it flew in 2024. _____ Copyright (C) 2025, Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Portions copyrighted by the respective providers.
