Falcon Heavy will fly its first mission for the US spy satellite agency – Spaceflight Now

Updated October 1, 10:28 p.m. EDT (02:28 UTC): SpaceX has adjusted the T-0 liftoff time.

A SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket is scheduled to launch Thursday evening from Florida on a classified mission for the National Reconnaissance Office, the U.S. spy satellite agency.

Codenamed NROL-97, the mission is scheduled to lift off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at 11:54 p.m. EDT (03:54 UTC). Based on danger warnings issued to aircraft and ships, it is expected to take a northeastward trajectory from Florida’s Space Coast.

Spaceflight Now will have live coverage approximately two hours before takeoff.

The NRO has previously carried payloads on 22 Falcon 9 rockets, but this is the first time it has used the heavy Falcon Heavy, which consists of three Falcon 9 boosters and an upper stage, topped with a payload fairing.

The powerful rocket, which takes off thanks to the power of 27 Merlin 1D engines, was presented with great fanfare in 2018 and will make its 14th flight.

Like most NRO missions, the nature of the flight is little known to the public. This is the first NRO mission to fly after being purchased in 2025 under the competitive National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 3 Lane 2 contract.

The Falcon Heavy core stage, serial number B1106, is brand new and will be used for this mission. The rocket’s side boosters both flew just a month ago to launch NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. The B1104 is making its second flight and the B1072 is on its fourth mission.

The side boosters will return to landing zones 1 and 2 of the Cape Canaveral space station. SpaceX returned the LZ-1 to service for this mission after being replaced by the LZ-40 at Space Launch Complex 40. However, this landing strip was used today by the booster returning from the Crew 13 mission launch.

The NRO said the payload fairing was previously used during the NROL-95 mission in July.

NROL-97 will be SpaceX’s third Falcon launch of the day. In addition to the Crew 13 mission, the company launched 130 payloads on the Transporter 13 rideshare mission from its West Coast hub at Vandenberg Space Station in California. This will be the first time the company has landed four boosters in a single day.