ULA’s Vulcan rocket certified to launch National Security Space Launch missions

CENTENNIAL, Colo. – Ready to usher in a new era of space capability for the nation, the United Launch Alliance Vulcan rocket has been certified by the U.S. Space Force to fly National Security Space Launch missions.

The announcement by ULA, which produces the rocket at its factory in Decatur, follows years of development and completing a comprehensive certification plan that included two certification missions.

“Thank you to all our customer partners who have worked hand-in-hand with us throughout this comprehensive certification process. We are grateful for the collaboration and excited to reach this critical milestone in Vulcan development,” said Tory Bruno, ULA’s president and CEO. “Vulcan is uniquely designed to meet the challenging requirements demanded by an expanding spectrum of missions for U.S. national security space launches.

“Moreover, this next-generation rocket provides high performance and extreme accuracy while continuing to deliver to our customer’s most challenging and exotic orbits.”

In September 2016, ULA entered into an agreement with the Air Force and outlined the plan to certify Vulcan according to the Air Force’s New Entrant Certification Guide. Since that time, the ULA and Space Force team completed 52 certification criteria, including more than 180 discrete tasks, two certification flight demonstrations, 60 payload interface requirement verifications, 18 subsystem design and test reviews, and 114 hardware and software audits.

“The SSC and ULA teams have worked together extremely closely, and certification of this launch system is a direct result of their focus, dedication, and teamwork,” said Gen Panzenhagen, Program Executive Officer for Assured Access to Space.

The move also ended the United States’ reliance on Russian rockets.

“The Vulcan rocket’s inaugural launch marked the beginning of a new era of space capabilities, providing higher performance while offering the world’s only high energy architecture rocket,” said Bruno.

Vulcan leverages the world’s highest-performing upper stage extending ULA’s industry-leading legacy of precision. Centaur V’s flexibility and extreme endurance enables the most complex orbital insertions providing unmatched industry capabilities.

This industry-leading capability enables large NSSL spacecraft direct injection into Geosynchronous Orbit (GSO) a critical requirement supporting the country facing evolving threats from China and Russia.

“Vulcan’s Centaur upper stage is a high-velocity and maneuverable platform to address evolving on-orbit threats in this new space warfighting domain and will offer extreme on-orbit endurance and flexibility for complex orbital insertions to meet the changing landscape and requirements of our nation,” said Bruno.