SpaceX and ULA have plans for a busy week of liftoffs

623
SHARE

ULA first scheduled for a launch on Sunday morning, September 27 but decided to delay it. ULA tweeted on Sunday that it was “taking extra precautions to ensure all issues” with the retraction system had been fixed.

ULA  re-scheduled the launch for 12:02 a.m.Tuesday. There will be a live webcast of the launch on the ULA site. 

Delta IV Heavy is a massive and powerful rocket

Delta IV Heavy is 330-foot-tall (100 meters). The rocket is encased by the Mobile Service Tower (MST), which rolls away before launch. The launcher has three hydrogen-fueled first-stage common core boosters that are strapped together.

This is ULA’s most powerful rocket. It is fueled by 465,000 gallons (1.76 million liters) of super-chilled liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The mega launcher generates over 2 million pounds of thrust.

This should mark the 12th flight of a Delta IV Heavy rocket, which first flew in 2004. 

There are only five Delta IV Heavy rockets left. ULA plans to retire Delta IV Heavy before rolling out its next-gen rocket, the Vulcan Centaur. ULA retired the Delta II rocket in 2018 and it’s Delta IV Medium in 2019.  

SpaceX to launch Falcon 9 carrying Starlink satellites

SpaceX plans to send up another batch of the company’s Starlink satellites on Monday. A Falcon 9 rocket loaded with 60 of the 570-pound satellites is scheduled to launch from the Kennedy Space Center at 10:22 a.m.