Air Force Tankers Will Soon Be Able to Share Data With F-35 and F-22 Fighters
The service plans to employ a number of KC-46 tanker aircraft equipped with a pod filled with communications equipment that could translate between the two waveforms.
Soon the United States Air Force’s Boeing KC-46 aerial refueling tankers will be outfitted with new equipment that will enable it to serve as a node in the service’s new Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS). The system is the Department of the Air Force’s contribution to the Combined Joint All Domain Command and Control (CJADC2), a Department of Defense effort to digitally connect all elements of the United States military across all five warfighting domains including air, land, sea, space and cyberspace.
321 Launch: Space news you may have missed over the past week
SpaceX has secured yet another trip to the moon.
Firefly Aerospace, which has a NASA contract to deliver science payloads to the lunar surface, said Thursday it would launch its Blue Ghost lander atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket no earlier than 2023.
Blue Ghost, a lunar lander capable of hosting 10 science payloads provided by other companies, will fly from Kennedy Space Center or Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Blue Ghost will provide the payloads with power and connectivity for an entire lunar day and beyond lunar dusk in Mare Crisium, a northeast basin on the near side of the moon.
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A nearly 200-foot Atlas V rocket soared from its Florida pad on Tuesday, taking the Space Force s newest satellite designed to detect ballistic missile launches back on Earth.
Powered by one main engine and two strap-on solid rocket boosters, the United Launch Alliance rocket vaulted off Cape Canaveral Space Force Station s Launch Complex 41 at 1:37 p.m., just six minutes after the window opened. ULA teams used the extra few minutes to resolve a minor issue with propellant loading systems.
The fifth SBIRS missile warning satellite in thermal vacuum testing. (Photo: Lockheed Martin)
The final pair of SBIRS satellites are ready for lift-off.
United Launch Alliance (ULA) is making final preparations to launch the fifth and sixth geosynchronous Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) satellites for the US Space Force.
‘The launch is on track for May 17 from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station,’ ULA announced on 15 May. The mission will launch on an Atlas V 421 configuration rocket.
The fifth and sixth SBIRS Geo launches will complete the Lockheed Martin-built satellite constellation.
SBIRS comprises a network of geosynchronous satellites and highly elliptical orbit payloads to provide persistent IR surveillance – as well as sophisticated ground control systems that manage the data – to support missile warning, missile defence, battlespace awareness and technical intelligence.
SpaceX wraps up day of worldwide launches with Florida Starlink mission Emre Kelly, Florida Today
Note: We ve brought you a front-row seat to rocket launches from Florida since 1966. Journalism like our space coverage takes time and resources. Please consider a subscription to stay up-to-date on Florida space news and launches. -
If there were any doubts about the accelerating pace of modern spaceflight, Thursday night s back-to-back-to-back launches likely quelled those thoughts – at least temporarily.
At Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket vaulted off its pad at 11:44 p.m. with Starlink internet satellites and then landed on a drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean. The mission was officially marked a success an hour after liftoff when all 60 flat-packed satellites were deployed to low-Earth orbit.