Welcome to the USSF-62 Launch Discussion and Updates Thread!
| Scheduled for (UTC) | 2024-04-11, 14:25 |
|---|---|
| Scheduled for (local) | 2024-04-11, 07:25 (PDT) |
| Launch site | SLC-4E, Vandenberg SFB, California |
| Payload | USSF-62 |
| Booster | B1082-3 |
| Landing site | LZ-4 |
| Customer | Department of Defense |
| Mission success criteria | Successful delivery of payloads to Sun-Synchronous Orbit |
Webcasts
| Stream | Link |
|---|---|
| Space Affairs | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMVBRa0diyg |
| Spaceflight Now | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kh9rJKPJ4Eo |
| NASASpaceflight | |
| The Launch Pad | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXTf-uotkFc |
| SpaceX | https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778424969900499061 |
| The Space Devs | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LTpHAM3OfE |
Stats
Sourced from NextSpaceflight and r/SpaceX:
☑️ 13th launch from SLC-4E this year
☑️ 4 days, 12:00:00 turnaround for this pad
☑️ 17th landing on LZ-4
☑️ 37th Falcon 9 launch this year, 38th SpaceX launch this year
☑️ 251st consecutive successful Falcon 9 launch (excluding Amos-6) (if successful)
☑️ 337th SpaceX mission overall (excluding Starship hops)
☑️ 350th SpaceX launch all time (including Starship hops)
☑️ 297th Falcon Family Booster landing, 305th Falcon recovery attempt
Mission and payload info
WSF-M (Weather System Follow-on - Microwave) is the next-generation operational environmental satellite system for the Department of Defense (DoD), to replace the microwave wavelength weather forecasting capabilities of the DMSP satellites.
Ball Aerospace has been selected in late November 2017 to be the prime contractor for 2 Low Earth Orbit (LEO) weather satellites with a passive microwave imaging radiometer instrument and hosted Government furnished energetic charged particle (ECP) sensor space weather payload developed by the Air Force Research Laboratory. The radiometer leverages the Ball-built Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Microwave Imager (GMI) instrument.
This mission will improve weather forecasting over maritime regions by taking global measurements of the atmosphere and ocean surface.
SpaceX hosted webcast is live. Atticus Vadera and JOHN INSPRUCKER are hosting!
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
Fewer Letters More Letters EELV Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle MECO Main Engine Cut-Off ~ MainEngineCutOff podcast NROL Launch for the (US) National Reconnaissance Office NSSL National Security Space Launch, formerly EELV SECO Second-stage Engine Cut-Off SES Formerly Société Européenne des Satellites, comsat operator ~ Second-stage Engine Start USSF United States Space Force
6 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 6 acronyms.
[Thread #40 for this sub, first seen 11th Apr 2024, 14:30] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778157833307234503
Targeting Thursday, April 11 for Falcon 9 to launch USSF-62 to low-Earth orbit from pad 4 East in California → http://spacex.com/launches
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778159556171805088
The U.S. Space Force is launching the Weather System Follow-on – Microwave Space Vehicle, the first of two satellites that will create a more hybrid Space-Based Environmental Monitoring architecture. The payload was encapsulated into our flight-proven fairings last week
Lifttoff!
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778315775637627189
Falcon 9 rolled out to the pad and went vertical ahead of Thursday’s launch of USSF-62. Webcast begins ~15 min. ahead of liftoff → https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=ussf-62
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778416012599366138
Clear skies and fair winds for this morning’s USSF-62 mission. All systems are looking good and weather is 95% favorable for a Falcon 9 launch of the U.S. Space Force’s newest weather space system → https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=ussf-62
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778416237850329338
Following stage separation, Falcon 9’s first stage will return to Earth and land at SpaceX’s Landing Zone 4
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778425261186597300
USSF-62 is the first National Security Space Launch mission to lift off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in nearly two years
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1778425507631313229
Falcon 9 launched NROL-85 to orbit on April 17, 2022
SECO, nominal orbital insertion.
Webcast coverage to return at T-48 minutes.
MECO, stage separation, M-vac ignition, stage 1 boostback burn, and fairing separation.
Edit: Fairings previously supported USSF-52. First NSSL mission with flight-proven fairings.
Stage 1 landing confirmed!
Hosted webcast is back.
Edit: SES-2, SECO-2, and nominal orbit insertion. Payload deploy scheduled for ~T+55 minutes.
