Terra Bella and Spaceflight Industries Sign Agreement for Falcon 9 Launch for Small Imaging Satellites

Spaceflight Industries announced that Terra Bella has signed an agreement with its launch services entity, Spaceflight, for a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch of Terra Bella SkySats.

Terra Bella will be the co-lead on Spaceflight’s SSO-A dedicated rideshare mission scheduled to launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California in late 2017.

The SSO-A mission will transport both government and commercial microsats and cubesats, and is currently at 90 percent capacity with more than 20 payloads from 10 countries manifested aboard the rocket. Confirmed spacecraft include:

• Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology’s (KAIST) NEXTSat-1 satellite, conducting scientific missions such as star formation and space storm measurements and also technology demonstration in space
• Iceye’s innovative SAR (synthetic aperture radar) micro-satellite for all condition imaging
• HawkEye 360’s first three formation-flying satellites to detect, characterize, and geolocate various RF signals worldwide

“We’re seeing a tide shift in the industry’s expectation for routine, reliable and affordable access to space,” said Curt Blake, president of Spaceflight. “The willingness of prominent commercial organizations to join forces for the advancement of global initiatives is very encouraging to the smallsat community, and to society as a whole.”

Aligning customers’ needs with available capacity and schedule, Spaceflight provides integrated launch services, including mission management, support hardware, payload integration and orbital deployment. Spaceflight has negotiated the launch of nearly 120 satellites with contracts to deploy more than 150 through 2018. The company is planning its largest launch – 89 spacecraft – to be deployed by its Sherpa tug from a Falcon 9 in 2017.