ULA’s Vulcan Rocket Prepares for December Launch
The first stage for ULA’s Vulcan rocket was lifted onto its launch platform at Cape Canaveral in January.
United Launch Alliance (ULA) has announced that its new Vulcan rocket will make its first demonstration flight on December 24, with backup launch dates available on December 25 and 26. The launch has been delayed due to the waiting for the delivery of an upper stage and final qualification testing following a test mishap earlier this year. ULA has informed Astrobotic, which is flying its first commercial Moon cargo lander on the Vulcan rocket, to ship its spacecraft from Pittsburgh to Florida in anticipation of a December launch.
ULA CEO Tory Bruno stated, “We need to finish building our upper stage and ship it down there (to Cape Canaveral). There’s some qualification testing in parallel. Both of those get done in November. The booster is already there ready to go, and the reason it’s Christmas Eve is because of science, orbital mechanics.” Bruno also mentioned that if there are any delays, the launch can potentially be moved to January.
The launch windows for the Vulcan rocket are tight, with only a few days each month available due to payload constraints. Astrobotic’s lunar lander aims to land at a specific location on the Moon known as the Gruithuisen Domes, requiring good lighting for scientific data collection.
In March, ULA experienced an explosion during a test of the Vulcan rocket’s Centaur upper stage, which caused a delay in the launch schedule. The Centaur V upper stage, designed for the Vulcan rocket, has undergone modifications to address the issue.
ULA’s anchor customers, the US military and Amazon, are eager for the Vulcan rocket’s debut. ULA was selected by the Pentagon to launch the majority of the military’s national security space missions through 2027. However, SpaceX’s rockets have been launching more frequently, while the Vulcan is yet to take off.
In addition to ULA, Astrobotic is preparing for the launch of its Peregrine lander, which is one of the first two commercial Moon landers under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program. Astrobotic has a contract to deliver scientific instruments to the Moon on the Peregrine lander, with another Moon landing scheduled for 2024. Intuitive Machines is another company participating in the CLPS program, with a plan to launch its Nova-C lander later this year.
The Vulcan rocket’s launch in December will place the Astrobotic lander into a high-altitude orbit before its journey to the Moon.
