SpaceX - Falcon Heavy - USSF-52 (OTV-7) - LC-39A - Kennedy Space Center - Space Affairs Livestream

SpaceX is targeting Sunday, December 10 at 8:14 p.m. ET (01:14 UTC, 02:14 CET December 11) for Falcon Heavy’s launch of the USSF-52 mission to orbit from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. A backup launch opportunity is available during the same time on Monday, December 11. This will be the fifth launch and landing of these Falcon Heavy side boosters, which previously supported USSF-44, USSF-67, Hughes JUPITER 3, and NASA’s Psyche mission. Following booster separation, Falcon Heavy’s two side boosters will land on SpaceX’s Landing Zones 1 and 2 (LZ-1 and LZ-2) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The first competitively won Space Force mission for Falcon Heavy. SpaceX’s $130 million Falcon Heavy bid beat ULA’s Delta IV Heavy. USSF-52 is a classified mission for the United States Space Force (USSF), which will carry the US Space Force X-37B in the OTV-7 mission to low Earth orbit. It is the first time the X-37 will fly on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy. The Boeing X-37, or the Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), is a reusable robotic spacecraft. A launch vehicle boosts it into space, then re-enters Earth’s atmosphere and lands as a spaceplane. The X-37 is operated by the United States Space Force for orbital spaceflight missions intended to demonstrate reusable space technologies. It is a 120-percent-scaled derivative of the earlier Boeing X-40. The X-37 began as a NASA project in 1999 before being transferred to the United States Department of Defense in 2004. Until 2019, the program was managed by Air Force Space Command. Most of the activities of the X-37B project are secret. The official U.S. Air Force statement is that the project is “an experimental test program to demonstrate technologies for a reliable, reusable, uncrewed space test platform for the U.S. Air Force“. The primary objectives of the X-37B are twofold: reusable spacecraft technology and operating experiments that can be returned to Earth. The Air Force states that this includes testing avionics, flight systems, guidance and navigation, thermal protection, insulation, propulsion, and re-entry systems. The seventh X-37B mission will be launched on SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy on December, 10 2023. The orbit is expected to be higher than previous missions. There will be no live streams from the second stage of the Falcon Heavy once the stage has separated. The two boosters will make a landing attempt at Landing Zone 1 & 2 at the Cape Canaveral Space Dorce Station, Florida. The center core will be expandable.