Welcome to Edition 9.01 of the Rocket Report! Back in January, I wrote about the 20 launches and landings we were most excited about in 2026. The list included things that were, at the time, officially scheduled to occur this year. I also gave my own view of the probability of each of these events actually happening before December 31. Halfway through the year, we can only count one of the events as completed, and that was NASA's Artemis II mission in April. Many are now scheduled for next year, proving again that delays are a constant in the space industry. A couple of them—such as the launch of NASA's Roman Space Telescope—do appear to be on track to happen soon.
As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets, as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
Swift Boost Mission reaches orbit. A pioneering commercial mission to reboost the orbit of NASA's Swift astronomy satellite launched early Friday after attempts earlier in the week were thwarted by bad weather and a technical issue. The Link servicing satellite developed by Katalyst Space Technologies soared to orbit on the tip of a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket that dropped from the belly of a modified L-1011 jetliner over the remote Pacific Ocean. Mission managers called off two launch attempts Tuesday and Wednesday due to poor weather around the L-1011's staging base on Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. On Thursday, "a launch vehicle issue temporarily prevented teams from deploying the rocket" after takeoff of the L-1011.
A rarity these days… This was the last scheduled flight of the air-launched Pegasus rocket, which had success in the 1990s and 2000s as a small satellite launcher for NASA and the US military. Usage of the Pegasus rocket has declined amid the rise of more affordable commercial launch options, especially SpaceX and Rocket Lab. Upon reaching orbit, Katalyst's Link satellite will spend several weeks approaching the Swift observatory, which is unable to counter atmospheric drag and is likely to reenter the atmosphere and burn up later this year. Launched in 2004, Swift was never designed to be serviced in orbit. The Link mission will attempt to raise the satellite's altitude and extend its mission.
Launch window set for India's first commercial rocket. Skyroot Aerospace is set to launch the first test flight of its Vikram-1 rocket between July 12 and August 4 from the Satish Dhawan Space Center, marking India's first private attempt to place a launch vehicle into orbit, the Economic Times reports. The mission aims to gather critical in-flight performance data across propulsion, stage separation, guidance, navigation and control, and overall vehicle performance. The test flight will originate from a launch pad originally built for India's government space program.
The sky's the limit... Skyroot has raised approximately $160 million to date, including a $60 million fundraising round announced in May, boosting its valuation over $1 billion. The Vikram-1 rocket is powered by three stages burning solid propellant and a fourth stage with liquid-fueled engines for the final maneuvers to place payloads into orbit. It is designed to place nearly a half-ton of payload mass into low-Earth orbit.
Rocket engines delivered for Rosalind Franklin. NASA has delivered the braking engines for the European Space Agency's Rosalind Franklin mission to Mars, European Spaceflight reports. The braking engines are one of three major contributions NASA has committed to the mission, along with launch services and Radioisotope Heater Units (RHUs) to keep the rover's instruments warm during cold Martian nights. The Rosalind Franklin rover is set for launch in late 2028 after years of delays, most of which were caused by geopolitical tensions and not technical issues.
American-made... NASA is providing the braking engines as part of the US contribution to the ESA-led mission, which aims to place the first European rover on the surface of Mars. The throttling MR-80 engines, which burn hydrazine fuel, were manufactured by L3Harris, formerly Aerojet Rocketdyne. Four of them will control the lander's final descent. NASA and L3Harris will deliver a fifth spare engine to Europe to round out the propulsion contribution. The same kinds of engines were used for the landings of NASA's Curiosity and Perseverance rovers on Mars in 2012 and 2021.
NASA taps Rocket Lab for three launches. NASA has selected Rocket Lab to launch a pair of science missions on three Electron rockets in 2027, Space News reports. One of the missions is the Polarized Submillimeter Ice-cloud Radiometer, or PolSIR, which consists of two suitcase-sized satellites to measure the rise and fall of ice crystals in tropical clouds. The PolSIR satellites will launch on back-to-back Electron rockets from Rocket Lab's spaceport in New Zealand no earlier than June 2027.
Going solo... The other launch NASA awarded to Rocket Lab is for the Total and Spectral Solar Irradiance Sensor-2, or TSIS-2, mission set to fly from New Zealand in early 2027. The TSIS-2 spacecraft will be the successor to TSIS-1, an instrument mounted on the outside of the International Space Station to measure the amount of solar energy entering the Earth's atmosphere. NASA decided to build a dedicated satellite for TSIS-2 and launch it on a rideshare mission on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Now, TSIS-2 will also get a dedicated ride to space with Rocket Lab.
Isar Aerospace announces all-German mission. Planet Labs is placing a bet on startup Isar Aerospace, signing up to launch at least one of its satellites on the Spectrum rocket that has yet to make orbit, Aviation Week & Space Technology reports. The launch from northern Norway could come as early as this year, Isar Aerospace said in an announcement Thursday. It would involve one of Planet's Pelican high-resolution Earth observation satellites assembled in the US-based company's new Berlin manufacturing facility. "With both satellite and rocket being built in Germany, this launch will be a national first for the country, demonstrating rapid advancements in the nation's sovereign space capabilities," Isar said in a statement.
How about that next launch?... Isar has not provided any update on the next test flight of its Spectrum rocket, which has missed several opportunities to launch since January. Officials scrubbed the most recent launch attempt June 15 after "detecting off nominal behavior in the vehicle's fluid systems." This mission will attempt to place a batch of CubeSats into orbit after lifting off from Andøya Spaceport in Norway. The first Spectrum launch failed in March 2025.
End of an era for Atlas V. The final flight of United Launch Alliance's Atlas V rocket is still several years off, but an important era for the once-dominant launch company came to a close early Thursday, Ars reports. The final flight of an Atlas V for the Amazon Leo broadband constellation lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, sending 29 satellites to orbit to move the network closer to providing initial services. It marked the ninth Atlas V flight for Amazon Leo and the fourth Atlas V launch in less than three months, hitting a career-ending cadence the rocket has rarely seen in nearly a quarter-century of service.
Farewell to the Bruiser... This was also the final launch of an Atlas V rocket with a payload fairing. Six more Atlas Vs in ULA's inventory are assigned to launch Boeing's Starliner crew capsules to the International Space Station, and those missions will fly without a fairing. Additionally, Thursday morning's mission was the last to use the Atlas V's most powerful configuration with five strap-on solid rocket boosters. ULA's next launch will be the return to flight of its newer Vulcan rocket, which has been grounded since February due to problems with its solid-fueled boosters.
A millenary milestone for SpaceX. With multiple launches each week, it's easy to lose sight of just how impressive the Falcon 9 rocket is. The Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy have flown 671 times, and the majority of those missions flew with reused boosters and engines. This week, SpaceX announced on X that it has manufactured the 1,000th Merlin 1D engine for the Falcon rocket's first stage. Nine of these kerosene-fueled engines power each Falcon 9 launch, and 27 of them fly on the Falcon Heavy. A modified version of the Merlin engine flies on the upper stages of both rockets.
Refurbishment over production… The production of 1,000 Merlin 1D engines is a remarkable milestone for any rocket engine, but it's important to note that the Merlin 1D is reusable. The Merlin 1D has logged more than 6,000 engine flights with 1,000 units. "With Falcon's reusability, recovering these engines has enabled continued reliability enhancements, making Merlin one of the most reliable rocket engines ever manufactured," SpaceX wrote on X. Another highly reliable, but single-use, rocket engine with similar thrust is Russia's RD-107/108. Five of those have powered each variant of Russia's R-7 rocket family since the 1950s, a legacy now carried on by the Soyuz launch vehicle. With more than 2,000 flights by Soyuz and its kin, that amounts to more than 10,000 RD-107 and 108 engines produced at a plant in Samara, Russia.
SpaceX launches rare GEO mission. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched Sunday carrying a multi-ton radio broadcasting satellite for SiriusXM to replace two aging satellites in geostationary Earth orbit, Spaceflight Now reports. The SXM-11 satellite is a behemoth as far as spacecraft go, with a launch mass of about roughly 7 metric tons (15,000 pounds). The satellite is destined for a position over the equator at an altitude of more than 22,000 miles (nearly 36,000 kilometers), where its velocity will match the Earth's rotation to provide continuous radio broadcast coverage over the United States.
Still in business… Of SpaceX's 78 launches of the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy this year, this was just the third carrying a payload heading for geostationary orbit, once the preferred destination for nearly all commercial communications satellites. Today, the trend is decidedly bending toward low-Earth orbit with megaconstellations like Starlink. But SiriusXM remains in business, as does the manufacturer of the SXM-11 satellite: Lanteris Space Systems, a subsidiary of Texas-based Intuitive Machines. The company, formerly branded as Maxar, was acquired by Intuitive Machines in January 2026 for about $800 million.
NASA pleased with Blue Origin's pad cleanup. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said this week that Blue Origin has been putting significant resources into the cleanup of its launch pad since the explosion of its New Glenn rocket there in late May, Ars reports. "Blue Origin's response to the situation is almost beyond impressive, and that's not just a NASA assessment," Isaacman said in response to questions from reporters on Wednesday afternoon. The explosion May 28 took out Blue Origin's only launch pad. NASA has a significant stake in Blue Origin's return to flight. It is counting on the company's Mk. 1 lander to carry dozens of cargo missions to the Moon, and its Mk. 2 lander to eventually ferry people to the lunar surface. The company's New Glenn rocket was expected to play a critical role in launching both of those landers.
New concept of operations… Blue Origin says it plans to return to flight with New Glenn before the end of the year, but the launch pad will look different. Dave Limp, Blue Origin's CEO, said the investigation into the explosion is still underway. "Early analysis points to the aft section of the first stage," he wrote on the company's website. During the anomaly, Blue Origin lost the lightning tower at its launch site as well as the massive transporter-erector, which moved the rocket from a nearby integration hangar out to the launch site and lifted it vertically for takeoff. For return to flight, Blue Origin will not rebuilding the transporter-erector, but will instead use a crane to lift the rocket vertical on its launch mount. Once there, and after pre-flight testing, a payload fairing would be placed atop the vehicle ahead of launch.
Next three launches
July 4: Long March 6A | Unknown Payload | Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, China | 09:31 UTC
July 5: Falcon 9 | Starlink 10-50 | Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida | 10:36 UTC
July 7: Falcon 9 | Transporter 17 | Vandenberg Space Force Base, California | 07:10 UTC
