Northrop Grumman wins $45.6 million contract to launch Space Force weather smallsat
Northrop Grumman has won $45.6 million contract from the Space Force to launch a weather smallsat, using its Minotaur-4 rocket that was formerly a military ICBM.
The weather satellite, built by General Atomics, is part of an effort by the military to stop building its big expensive and continuously delayed weather satellites and instead buy the services from the private sector. This three year demonstration mission will prove whether General Atomics’ weather satellite can do the job. The Space Force has also contracted with Orion Space Systems to test its own weather satellite in orbit.
For Northrop Grumman, this contract helps keep its launch business alive while it awaits a new American engine for its Antares rocket, replacing the Russian engines it has previously depended on.
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Northrop Grumman has won $45.6 million contract from the Space Force to launch a weather smallsat, using its Minotaur-4 rocket that was formerly a military ICBM.
The weather satellite, built by General Atomics, is part of an effort by the military to stop building its big expensive and continuously delayed weather satellites and instead buy the services from the private sector. This three year demonstration mission will prove whether General Atomics’ weather satellite can do the job. The Space Force has also contracted with Orion Space Systems to test its own weather satellite in orbit.
For Northrop Grumman, this contract helps keep its launch business alive while it awaits a new American engine for its Antares rocket, replacing the Russian engines it has previously depended on.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
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4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
I just can not believe that we can not find a way to quickly make a copy of the Russian engine.
Even a lend lease deal with Russia would have been faster than this.
Once we start to make their engines we could have been improving them for the rest of time until they changed enough to no longer qualify as a Russian engine.
Is the issue that they were that good, or good enough for the price point.
The Merlin engine has shown itself to be as reliable, no?
Didn’t the US already pay for this rocket and they are just pulling it out of storage?