TRACERS

FAA launch notifications listed the primary launch date for SPACEX TRACERS from Vandenberg SFB as 07/22/25 with a primary window of 1805Z–2003Z and a backup window of 07/23/25 1805Z–2003Z.

The July 18, 2025 NASA blog announced that TRACERS was targeting launch on July 22 from Space Launch Complex 4 East and that three additional NASA small satellites would launch on the same flight.

The July 23, 2025 launch deployed TRACERS and additional payloads including Athena EPIC (Athena), York Space Systems' Bard (host for PExT), Maverick Space Systems' REAL, Tyvak's LIDE, and Skykraft 4 satellites.

As of June 27, 2025, TRACERS was described as transiting the cusp more than 3000 times during the 12-month primary science mission with inter-spacecraft along-track separations varying from 10 to 120 seconds (75 to 900 km).

As of August 5, 2025, TRACERS Space Vehicle 1 (SV1) experienced an issue with its power subsystem on July 25 that resulted in intermittent contacts and a loss of communication while Space Vehicle 2 (SV2) remained operational and had started commissioning.

TRACERS was designed to be launched in a stacked configuration as a primary rideshare or 'cake topper' on a SpaceX Falcon 9.

TRACERS consists of two identical spacecraft that will fly in tandem through the polar cusps in a circular Sun-synchronous orbit and were built by Millennium Space Systems using the ALTAIR core bus platform.

After instrument integration, Millennium Space Systems will perform environmental testing and deliver the TRACERS spacecraft to Vandenberg Space Force Base for a projected 2025 launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 to sun-synchronous orbit.

Millennium Space Systems received a contract in 2019 to develop and integrate two identical satellites for TRACERS.