WASHINGTON — A Falcon 9 successfully placed a pair of Galileo navigation satellites into orbit April 27 in a launch that was unusual in several ways.
The Falcon 9 lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center at 8:34 p.m. ET, carrying the Galileo satellites GM25 and FM27. The European Union Space Program Agency, or EUSPA, the European agency that manages Galileo’s operations, confirmed that the satellites were in orbit and operating several hours later.
The launch took place amid a degree of secrecy usually reserved for classified national security launches. SpaceX did not provide any video of the launch after stage separation and ended its webcast after confirmation of payload fairing separation. The company defers to the client for additional updates on the mission.
It is unclear what prompted this increased secrecy. Previous launches of Galileo satellites on Ariane and Soyuz rockets from French Guiana had greater coverage, as did the Falcon 9 launches of Galileo’s U.S. counterpart, the Global Positioning System.
Neither the European Commission nor the European Space Agency announced the launch in advance. In statements after the successful launch, European officials carefully avoided mentioning how the satellites were launched.
“2 new Galileo satellites were successfully launched last night,” said Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for the Internal Market. published on social networks April 28. “While waiting for Ariane6, the 2024 launches are crucial for Galileo’s resilience, robustness and continuity of its civil and military applications. »
This statement is the closest thing to acknowledging why the satellites were launched on Falcon 9. The retirement of Ariane 5, the loss of access to the Soyuz rocket after the invasion of Ukraine by the Russia more than two years ago and delays in the introduction of Ariane 6 have left Europe without its own means of launching Galileo satellites, a situation described as a ‘launcher crisis’ by the director general of ESA, Josef Aschbacher.
Breton said in November 2023 that the European Commission was finalizing an agreement with SpaceX for two Falcon 9 launches, each carrying two Galileo satellites, planned for 2024. This contract was valued at 180 million euros ($193 million), a he declared.
This launch was the second European institutional mission to fly on a Falcon 9 due to the current launcher crisis, following the launch of ESA’s Euclid space telescope in July 2023. Another pair of Galileo satellites will be launched on a Falcon 9 later this year, with separate Falcon 9 launches of ESA’s EarthCARE Earth science mission and the Hera asteroid mission.
For SpaceX, this launch was on the 20th flight of this booster, matching a reuse mark set earlier in the month by another booster launching a set of Starlink satellites. The booster has already launched missions ranging from a GPS satellite and Intuitive Machines’ IM-1 lunar lander to 13 sets of Starlink satellites.
The launch was also the final mission of this booster, designed B1060. SpaceX said the additional performance required to place the Galileo satellites into medium Earth orbit meant the booster could not be recovered. It broke a streak of 146 Falcon 9 launches with a booster landing dating back to November 2022, when SpaceX conducted consecutive Falcon 9 launches carrying geostationary satellites where the boosters were expended.
“We are working to qualify our fleet of Falcon boosters and fairings to support 40 missions each,” the company said after liftoff, noting that this launch was the 200th to use previously stolen payload fairings.
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