Overview
- The Vulcan is scheduled to lift off from SLC-41 at 12:54 p.m. EST on Friday, Nov. 13, carrying 40 Amazon Leo satellites to a roughly 450 km, 51.9° circular orbit.
- Two prior flights saw GEM-63XL booster nozzles suffer burn-through and partial separation on the second flight in October 2024 and on the USSF-87 mission on Feb. 12, 2026, which led the U.S. Space Force to pause national-security Vulcan launches.
- Northrop Grumman and ULA implemented design and manufacturing changes to the GEM-63XL nozzle and Blue Origin qualified and installed a retrofit on the BE-4 main oxidizer valve; LV-01 will fly with those modifications to collect real flight data.
- The U.S. Space Force and contractors will analyze telemetry from this commercial mission before deciding if Vulcan can resume Pentagon missions, and Amazon’s deployment plan relies on many more Vulcan launches if the rocket is cleared.
- A successful flight would let ULA increase Vulcan cadence for commercial and government work and help Amazon stay on schedule to build its multi-thousand-satellite broadband network under its FCC timeline.