The United Launch Alliance Vulcan rocket successfully launched Friday on its second certification (Cert-2) flight.
"We had an observation on one of our solid rocket boosters (SRB) that we are reviewing but we are overall pleased with the rocket’s performance and had a bullseye insertion.”
Tory Bruno, ULA
Liftoff occurred at 7:25 a.m. EDT from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station carrying experiments and demonstrations associated with future capabilities of Centaur V, the world’s highest-performing upper stage. Centaur V provides 2.5 times the energy and 450 times the endurance of its predecessors, enabling the most complex orbital insertions within the most challenging and clandestine orbits, according to ULA.
During the launch, observers noted an anomaly with one of the solid rocket boosters strapped to the main booster, though the issue did not appear to affect the ability of the rocket to reach its planned orbit.
"The success of Vulcan’s second certification flight heralds a new age of forward-looking technology committed to meeting the ever-growing requirements of space launch and supporting our nation’s assured access to space," said Tory Bruno, ULA’s president and CEO. "We had an observation on one of our solid rocket boosters (SRB) that we are reviewing but we are overall pleased with the rocket’s performance and had a bullseye insertion. Vulcan provides high performance and greater affordability while continuing to deliver our unmatched reliability and orbital precision for all our customers across the national security, civil and commercial markets.”
“Vulcan is built with the strength of a national workforce whose unmatched dedication and innovation has modernized the very best of our industry-leading heritage,” said Mark Peller, vice president of Vulcan Development. “The foundation of Vulcan’s purpose-built design rests on the best of what we’ve learned from more than 130 combined years of launch experience with Atlas and Delta.”
The Cert-2 mission served as the second of two certification flights required for the U.S. Space Force’s certification process and ULA has now completed all requirements for certification. ULA continues to work closely with the U.S. Space Force as they take the next few weeks to review the data and compare it to ULA’s first certification mission to ensure that the vehicle performed as expected and there are no additional items that need review. Once the evaluation is complete to the Space Force's standards, the Vulcan rocket will be certified to launch national security missions.
“The team will continue to modify our infrastructure as we work towards an accelerated launch cadence to meet our customers’ manifest requirements while building off today’s successful launch and developing future Vulcan upgrades, including SMART reuse plans for downrange, non-propulsive recovery of Vulcan engines,” Bruno said.
ULA has sold more than 70 Vulcan launches to date, including 38 missions for Amazon’s Project Kuiper and multiple national security space launch missions as part of the country’s Phase 2 launch procurement.