Helios will transport the lunar lander to low lunar orbit within one week after deployment in Low Earth Orbit (LEO).
Impulse estimates that the Helios and lunar lander combination can deliver up to 6 tons of payload mass to the Moon across two missions per year starting in 2028.
Helios is expected to have flown multiple missions by 2028.
Impulse Space plans to fly the Helios kick stage for the first time next year.
The lunar lander will separate from Helios and land on the Moon’s surface.
The Helios propulsion system is set to fly its first mission next year.
Impulse Space's lunar cargo delivery service builds on the company's existing mission profile of bringing payloads to Geostationary Orbit (GEO) using the Helios propulsion system.
Impulse's lunar mission architecture pairs the Helios kick stage with a new lunar lander built by Impulse.
Impulse Space plans to develop a lunar lander that will use its existing Helios kick stage to reach the Moon.
After launch, Helios will transport the lunar lander to low lunar orbit within a week.
A combination of the Helios kick stage and the new Impulse Space lander, launched on a standard medium- or heavy-lift rocket, can deliver approximately 3 tons of cargo to the Moon.
The Helios transfer vehicle is designed to perform rapid transfers of payloads from low Earth orbit to geostationary or other orbits.
Helios will transport deployed payloads from LEO to geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO) and geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO).
The inaugural Helios mission will deliver a Mira vehicle to GTO as part of the VICTUS SURGO mission.
Falcon 9’s second stage will deploy Helios and its payloads into low Earth orbit (LEO).
The Helios vehicle is a kick stage designed to transport payloads from low Earth orbit to geostationary orbit in under 24 hours.
Subsequent contracted Falcon 9 launches will also feature Helios with payloads to be determined at a later date.
Impulse Space selected Falcon 9 to launch the contracted Helios and associated missions.
The first contracted Falcon 9 mission will be the inaugural launch of Helios and is targeted for mid-2026.
Impulse Space signed a contract with SpaceX for three Falcon 9 launches to support the development and deployment of Impulse Space’s Helios and Mira vehicles.