The United Launch Alliance Atlas V 401 rocket with NASA’s Landsat 9 satellite arrives at the launch pad at Space Launch Complex 3 (SLC-3) at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, on Sept. 27, 2021, after rolling out from the Vertical Integration Facility. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett
NASA is targeting 11:12 a.m. PDT (2:12 p.m. EDT) today, Sept. 27, for launch of Landsat 9. The launch window is 30 minutes. The NASA-U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Landsat 9 Earth-monitoring satellite will lift off atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex-3 at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
Weather officials with the U.S. Space Force’s Space Launch Delta 30 are predicting a 90% chance of favorable weather conditions for today’s launch, with ground winds serving as the primary weather concern.
Landsat 9 will continue the legacy of monitoring Earth’s land and coastal regions that began with the first Landsat satellite in 1972. Images from Landsat 9 will be added to nearly 50 years of free and publicly available data from the mission – the longest data record of Earth’s landscapes taken from space.
Beginning at 10:30 a.m. PDT (1:30 p.m. EDT), join us here on the blog for live coverage, and follow along on NASA TV or the agency’s website for the live launch broadcast.
Encapsulated within the United Launch Alliance (ULA) payload fairing, the Landsat 9 spacecraft undergoes final preparations before launch inside the Integrated Processing Facility at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Aug. 25, 2021. Photo credit: USSF 30th Space Wing/Chris Okula
With two days to go until liftoff of Landsat 9, the NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) joint mission to monitor Earth’s land and coastal regions, everything is on track for Monday’s planned launch, with the 30-minute launch window starting at 11:12 a.m. PDT (2:12 p.m. EDT).
The launch team adjusted the launch window by one minute to avoid the CloudSat and Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation (CALIPSO) spacecraft, which are circling the globe in an orbit near the one planned for Landsat 9.
“Landsat is the ninth mission in a series, and it is an absolutely critical piece of NASA’s science portfolio,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator, NASA Science Mission Directorate. “NASA has had an amazing year of science, launching a lot of technologies to Mars and deep space, and this mission is one of those dedicated to looking at our most beautiful planet.”
The U.S. Space Force’s Space Launch Delta 30 is predicting an 90% chance of favorable weather conditions for the launch. The primary weather concerns are ground winds.
The historic mission has remained on track, despite challenges from a worldwide pandemic, including current pandemic demands for medical liquid oxygen that impacted the delivery of the needed liquid nitrogen supply to Vandenberg by the Defense Logistics Agency and its supplier Airgas. Airgas converts the liquid nitrogen to gaseous nitrogen needed for launch vehicle testing and countdown sequence.
“We certainly had our challenges with the pandemic and liquid nitrogen supply chain issues causing a seven-day delay,” said Launch Director Tim Dunn of NASA’s Launch Services Program. “We’re back on track, and I’m personally thrilled to be the launch director for Landsat 9. The NASA engineers and analysts, working alongside our United Launch Alliance colleagues, take great pride in launching this mission.”
Landsat 9 is scheduled to lift off aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V 401 rocket from Space Launch Complex-3 at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. NASA’s Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy Space Center, is managing the launch.
“The 9th Landsat will contribute a great understanding of what’s happening to the surface of our Earth,” said Karen St. Germain, director of NASA Earth Science Division. “It will provide vital foundational knowledge. Its power is really released when we combine the data from Landsat with our other Earth science missions. The data can tell us not just what is happening, but why.”
Landsat 9, managed by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, will carry two instruments: the Operational Land Imager 2, which collects images of Earth’s landscapes in visible, near-infrared and shortwave infrared light, and the Thermal Infrared Sensor 2, which measures the temperature of land surfaces.
“There’s no doubt that the Landsat mission is at the core of the Department of the Interior’s important work,” said Tanya Trujillo, assistant secretary for Water and Science that the Department of the Interior. “We work every day to protect our natural resources and cultural heritage and provide scientific information about those resources that our communities can rely on.”
When it launches, Landsat 9 will join its predecessors in helping scientists track changes to Earth’s land surfaces at a scale that shows natural and human-caused change. Currently, both Landsat 7 and Landsat 8 are in a near-polar orbit of our planet. Each satellite repeats its orbital pattern every 16 days, with the two spacecraft offset so that each spot on Earth is measured by one or the other every eight days. Landsat 9 will join Landsat 8 in orbit and will replace Landsat 7, taking its place in orbit.
“For nearly 50 years, Landsat satellites have documented Earth’s changing landscapes, said Michael Egan, Landsat 9 program executive for NASA’s Earth Science Division. “As the Earth’s population approaches 8 billion people, Landsat 9 will continue to provide consistent data about the changing land cover and land use of our planet.”
Tune in to NASA TV or the agency’s website at 10:30 a.m. PDT (1:30 p.m. EDT) Monday, or follow along right here on the mission blog, for live launch countdown coverage. Learn more about the mission at: https://www.nasa.gov/specials/landsat.
Emil Atz, a Boston University mechanical engineering PhD candidate, and Jacqueline Bachrach, Boston University, mechanical engineering junior, work on the CuPID spacecraft. Photo credit: Boston University Photography/Cydney Scott
Two small research satellites that are launching as part of NASA’s 34th Educational Launch of Nanosatellites (ELaNa) mission promise exciting insights for the university researchers that developed them. The CubeSats will launch as secondary payloads when Landsat 9 lifts off at 11:11 a.m. PDT (2:11 p.m. EDT) Monday, Sept. 27, from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
Landsat 9, launching aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, is a joint mission between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey and will continue a nearly 50-year legacy of Earth-observing Landsat satellites. The two CubeSats will hitch a ride in the spacecraft’s secondary payload adapter.
CUTE aims to provide a better understanding of atmospheric loss on all types of planets by measuring atmospheric escape rates from giant exoplanets. Atmospheric escape is the loss of mass from a planet’s atmosphere over time. This phenomenon can affect a planet’s long-term physical properties, including the sizes of extrasolar planets and the habitability of rocky planets.
CUTE will target 10 to 12 exoplanets during its eight-month science mission, conducting a survey of heavy elements, such as iron and magnesium, escaping from the atmospheres of the most extreme planets in the galaxy.
“Measuring atmospheric escape rates allows astronomers and planetary scientists to better understand the physics behind atmospheric loss,” said Dr. Kevin France, associate professor in the Department of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder and principal investigator of the CUTE mission. “This in turn allows us to better understand the atmospheres of known planets and predict the properties of extrasolar planets we have not yet discovered.”
Project Manager Rick Kohnert and graduate student Arika Egan show the CUTE spacecraft during dispenser installation testing at the University of Colorado. Photo Credit: University of Colorado/Kevin France
The spacecraft will carry out its mission using a magnifying spectrograph fed by a rectangular Cassegrain telescope. CUTE is sponsored by NASA’s Science Mission Directorate Astrophysics Division.
CuPID will study how energy from the Sun is deposited into the Earth’s magnetosphere – a protective bubble around our home planet. This mission could solve long-standing questions on space weather and solar wind magnetosphere coupling. CuPID will measure X-rays in space using a novel wide field-of-view telescope to image reconnection signatures in the magnetosphere. Reconnection occurs when the Sun is active enough that its magnetic field fuses with the Earth’s. Using this soft X-ray telescope, CuPID will generate first-of-their-kind images of this phenomenon.
“Launch is scheduled to occur during a lecture of an orbital dynamics course I’m teaching this fall. I plan to have the class online watching. I’m not sure I could think of a better real-world example of the material,” said Dr. Brian Walsh, CuPID’s principal investigator, and professor of Mechanical Engineering and member of the Center for Space Physics at Boston University.
The CuPID mission, led by Boston University in Massachusetts, is a collaboration with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center; Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland; Merrimack College, North Andover, Massachusetts; Drexel University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and the University of Alaska, Fairbanks; and is supported by NASA’s Science Mission Directorate Heliophysics Division and Small Satellite Project Office.
NASA’s CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI) selected the CubeSats assigned to the ELaNa 34 mission by NASA’s Launch Services Program (LSP) based at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. LSP manages the ELaNa manifest, and CSLI provides launch opportunities for small satellite payloads built by universities, high schools, NASA Centers, and non-profit organizations.
To date, NASA has selected 202 CubeSat missions, 122 of which have been launched into space, with 43 more missions scheduled for launch within the next 12 months. The selected CubeSats represent participants from 42 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and 102 unique organizations. CSLI’s 2021 Announcement of Partnership Opportunity is open for CubeSat proposals until Nov. 19, 2021.
Stay connected with these CubeSat missions on social media by following NASA’s Launch Services Program on Facebook and Twitter.
The Landsat 9 spacecraft is lifted for mating to the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at Space Launch Complex 3 at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Sept. 15, in preparation for liftoff targeted for Sept. 27. Photo credit: USAF 30th Space Wing/Pedro Caril
NASA will hold a prelaunch briefing tomorrow, Sept. 25, at 1 p.m. PDT (4 p.m. EDT), for Landsat 9, the NASA and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) joint mission to monitor Earth’s land and coastal regions.
Briefing participants are:
The United Launch Alliance Atlas V booster for NASA’s Landsat 9 mission is positioned inside the Vertical Integration Facility at Space Launch Complex 3 at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, prior to mating with the Landsat spacecraft. Photo credit: NASA/Randy Beaudoin
Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator, NASA Science Mission Directorate
Karen St. Germain, Director, NASA Earth Science Division
Tanya Trujillo, Assistant Secretary for Water and Science, Dept. of Interior
Michael Egan, Landsat 9 Program Executive, NASA Earth Science Division
Tim Dunn, NASA Launch Director, Launch Services Program
Scott Messer, Program Manager, United Launch Alliance
Addison Nichols, Weather Officer, Space Launch Delta 30
Meteorologists with the U.S. Space Force’s Space Launch Delta 30 predict a 90% percent chance of favorable weather for launch on Monday morning, with liftoff winds around 10 knots posing the main concern.
Launch coverage will begin at 10:30 a.m. PDT (1:30 p.m. EDT) on Sept. 27. You can follow the countdown milestones here on the blog and on the NASA website.
Stay connected with the mission on social media, and let people know you’re following it on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram using the hashtag #Landsat and tag these accounts:
Since 1972, Landsat has monitored Earth’s land and coastal regions, contributing to nearly 50 years of free and publicly available data from the mission – the longest data record of Earth’s landscapes taken from space. In this Landsat satellite image, the sands and seaweed in the Bahamas create multicolored, fluted patterns. Photo credit: NASA/GSFC/Landsat
Officials from NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) will discuss the launch of the Landsat 9 satellite during a science briefing at 10 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. EDT) Friday, Sept. 24.
The Landsat 9 launch is targeted to lift off Monday, Sept. 27, from Space Launch Complex-3 at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, with the 30-minute launch window starting at 11:11 a.m. PDT (2:11 p.m. EDT). The science briefing will air live on NASA TV, the NASA app, and the agency’s website.
Data from Landsat 9 will add to nearly 50 years of free and publicly available data from the Landsat program. The Landsat program is the longest-running enterprise for acquisition of satellite imagery of Earth. It is a joint NASA/USGS program. Researchers harmonize Landsat data to detect the footprint of human activities and measure the effects of climate change on land over decades.
Once fully operational in orbit, Landsat 9 will replace Landsat 7 and join its sister satellite, Landsat 8, in continuing to collect data from across the planet every eight days. This calibrated data will continue the Landsat program’s critical role in monitoring land use and helping decision-makers manage essential resources including crops, water resources, and forests.
Briefing participants, in speaking order, are:
Jeff Masek, Project Scientist, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Chris Crawford, Project Scientist, USGS
Alyssa Whitcraft, Associate Director and Program Manager, NASA Harvest Consortium
Del Jenstrom, Landsat 9 Project Manager, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Brian Sauer, Landsat 9 Project Manager, USGS
Sabrina Chapman, Manager, System Engineering, Northrop Grumman Space Systems
Sarah Lipscy, OLI-2 Senior Engineer, Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp.
NASA’s Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy Space Center, is managing the launch. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center will manage the mission. Teams from Goddard also built and tested one of the two instruments on Landsat 9, the Thermal Infrared Sensor 2 (TIRS-2) instrument. TIRS-2 will use thermal imaging to make measurements that are used to calculate soil moisture and detect the health of plants.
The USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, will operate the mission and manage the ground system, including maintaining the Landsat archive. Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado, built and tested the Operational Land Imager 2 (OLI-2) instrument, another imaging sensor that provides data in the visible, near infrared, and shortwave infrared portions of the spectrum. United Launch Alliance is the rocket provider for Landsat 9’s launch. Northrop Grumman in Gilbert, Arizona, built the Landsat 9 spacecraft, integrated it with instruments, and tested the observatory.
Stay connected with the mission on social media, and let people know you’re following it on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram using the hashtag #Landsat and tag these accounts:
NASA and United Launch Alliance currently are reviewing the launch date for the Landsat 9 spacecraft scheduled to launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Attaching the spacecraft to the Atlas V rocket has been delayed due to out-of-tolerance high winds for the operation and conflicts with other customers using the Western Range.
The Landsat 9 mission now is expected to launch from Vandenberg’s Space Launch Complex 3 no earlier than Monday, Sept. 27, 2021.
Landsat 9 is a joint NASA and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) mission that continues the legacy of monitoring Earth’s land and coastal regions, which began with the first Landsat in 1972.
Inside the Integrated Processing Facility at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, both United Launch Alliance (ULA) payload fairings are secured around the Landsat 9 spacecraft on Aug. 16, 2021. Photo credit: USSF 30th Space Wing/Chris Okula
NASA and United Launch Alliance currently are reviewing the launch date for the Landsat 9 spacecraft scheduled to launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Current pandemic demands for medical liquid oxygen have impacted the delivery of the needed liquid nitrogen supply to Vandenberg by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) and its supplier Airgas. Airgas converts the liquid nitrogen to gaseous nitrogen needed for launch vehicle testing and countdown sequences. DLA and Airgas now have implemented efforts to increase the supply of liquid nitrogen to Vandenberg. The Landsat 9 launch now is expected no earlier than Thursday, Sept. 23, 2021.
Landsat 9 is a joint NASA and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) mission that continues the legacy of monitoring Earth’s land and coastal regions, which began with the first Landsat in 1972. The mission will launch on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 3 at Vandenberg.
