SpaceX will launch a new batch of data satellites to low Earth orbit on behalf of the United States Space Force’s Space Development Agency (SDA) early Monday morning.
The mission, dubbed Tranche 1 Transport Layer A (T1TL-A), is the fourth mission sending production satellites into orbit for the SDA. This is one piece of a broad constellation — called the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) — designed to support the U.S. military and its allies through space-based capabilities, like missile tracking and secure communications.
Liftoff of the Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 4 East is scheduled for 1:17 a.m. PDT (4:17 a.m. EDT / 0817 UTC). The rocket will depart Vandenberg on a southerly trajectory.
Spaceflight Now will have live coverage beginning about 30 minutes prior to liftoff.
The mission will use Falcon 9 first stage booster B1103. This will be its sixth flight following the launches of the SDA’s T1TL-E, NROL-179, and three batches of Starlink satellites.
Less than 7.5 minutes after liftoff, SpaceX plans to land B1103 at Landing Zone 4. If successful, this will be the 37th landing at LZ-4 and the 668th Falcon booster landing to date.
The T1TL-A mission is one of 23 missions awarded to SpaceX as part of the National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 2 contract awarded in August 2020, which is managed by the U.S. Space Force’s Space Systems Command (SSC). The previous missions from the SDA have already been launched:
The T1TL-B and -E missions featured satellites manufactured by York Space Systems and the T1TL-C satellites were produced by Lockheed Martin.
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