Verified facts grounded in source documentation.
The Atlas V 541 configuration has launched missions for the National Reconnaissance Office, carried the GOES-R and GOES-S satellites, and most recently launched the Mars 2020 mission with the Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter.
NROL-82 was the National Reconnaissance Office’s first launch from Vandenberg since January 2019.
The National Reconnaissance Office plans to sign new contracts with commercial providers of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite imagery to better understand private-sector capabilities.
NROL-129 was the National Reconnaissance Office’s 54th launch since 1996 and its first launch on a Minotaur 4.
After 2023 the NRO will develop a new contract vehicle to replace EnhancedView that will incorporate multiple vendors.
Rocket Lab successfully launched a classified payload for the National Reconnaissance Office on 2020-01-30.
The WFIRST telescope uses a 2.4-meter primary mirror that NASA inherited from another U.S. government agency, most likely the National Reconnaissance Office.
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy has been certified for national security missions but was not able to meet the mission-unique requirements for very large NRO satellites needing difficult orbits at the time the launches were acquired in 2016 and 2017.
The National Reconnaissance Office awarded its first commercial hyperspectral imaging study contract to HySpecIQ on 2019-09-23.