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For the third time in seven months, NASA has contracted SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket to launch a high-value science spacecraft, bringing the number of active contracts for the world’s most powerful rocket to double digits.
In an increasingly less surprising twist, a spokesperson for SpaceX competitor United Launch Alliance (ULA) said the company – the only other competitor for the contract – took of his offer because he no longer had Atlas V rockets available. The ULA announced earlier this year that it had officially stopped selling Atlas V launches, leaving a total of 29 additional launches – all already reserved for specific customers – before the rocket was completely retired. Unfortunately for ULA, the Vulcan Centaur rocket it has been developing to replace Atlas V and Delta IV since 2013 or 2014 is years behind schedule.
Somewhat inexplicably, even though ULA offered Vulcan to launch a high-value NASA payload in Q4 2024 as early as this year, the company apparently didn’t think its next-gen rocket would be ready to go. launch a different payload in Q2 2024. In response, NASA’s only option to launch the GOES-U geostationary weather satellite was SpaceX’s bid, securing it the contract when ULA withdrew from the competition.
Part of a fleet of 18 satellites dating back to the 1970s, GOES-U will be the fourth and (now) last satellite in a modern extension of the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) program contracted by NASA for NOAA in 2008 In 2013, GOES-T and GOES-U were added to the original GOES-R and GOES-S, nominally resulting in four satellites built by Lockheed Martin for an average of around $ 350 million each.
ULA or ULA-heritage rockets have launched all 18 GOES satellites to date and there was little reason to believe that this would not continue until the end of the GOES-R series. However, due to significant delays in developing ULA’s Vulcan, it appears that the company is now temporarily unable to compete for launch contracts. This makes it difficult to judge whether SpaceX would have won GOES-U without ULA’s withdrawal, although it’s hard to imagine that ULA could have beaten Falcon Heavy’s $ 153 million contract price.
In one of the most unequivocal signs of SpaceX’s immense impact on even the launch contracts it lost, the first two Atlas V launch contracts of ULA’s GOES-R series were each valued at $ 261 million to 2021 dollars when awarded in 2013. In 2019, NASA again awarded ULA a contract to launch GOES-T on an identical Atlas V 541 rocket – but this time for just $ 177 million. dollars (2021).
It is not known what type of configuration Falcon Heavy will be in for its GOES-U launch in April 2024. For ULA’s GOES-R and GOES-S launches, Atlas V delivered each weather satellite of approximately 5,200 kg. (~ 11,500 lb) in an “optimized geosynchronous transfer orbit [GTO]. “Much like a middle ground between an elliptical GTO launch and a geostationary orbit (GEO) launch, both missions required the Centaur top stage of Atlas V to perform three separate burns – and one after a three hill climb. In theory, Falcon Heavy should be able to easily launch GOES-U into a similar orbit while still allowing SpaceX to recover all three boosters, although it’s possible that the safety margins mean the central core is depleted.
Either way, Falcon Heavy continues to prove that SpaceX made the right choice by investing well over $ 500 million of its own money to develop the rocket. In 2021 alone, the rocket won three NASA launch contracts worth around $ 660 million. In 2020, SpaceX won another Falcon Heavy launch contract of around $ 120 million from NASA. In total, the rocket has now earned the company ten active launch contracts, including four or five in 2022 alone: ViaSat-3, USSF-52, NASA’s Psyche, USSF-67 and possibly an Inmarsat communications satellite. In 2023, Falcon Heavy could launch Astrobotic’s first Griffin Moon lander with NASA’s VIPER rover, followed by GOES-U, Europa Clipper and (although delays are very likely) two parts of the Lunar Gateway space station from The NASA.
Including the USSF-44 (scheduled to launch next month) and assuming Inmarsat’s I-6 F2 communications satellite ends up on Falcon Heavy, the rocket now has ten launch contracts after winning GOES-U. Additionally, while the program appears to be in limbo, NASA has technically announced plans for SpaceX to launch at least two Dragon XL spacecraft on Falcon Heavy to resupply the Lunar Gateway station – a total of 12 missions if those plans come together. transform into tangible contracts.
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