NASA launches three small spacecraft for propulsion, astronomy and satellite inspection missions

NASA says three of its supported small spacecraft launched at 11:32 a.m. PDT on October 1 from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9. Carried on the Transporter-18 rideshare mission, they are intended to test spacecraft propulsion, study how matter and radiation move through galaxies, and develop ways to inspect inactive satellites in orbit. The launch starts those missions; NASA has not reported results from their planned experiments or inspections.

The spacecraft are ASCENT Propulsion Dual Mode, the Supernova Remnants and Proxies for ReIonization Testbed Experiment, known as SPRITE, and the Small Spacecraft Propulsion and Inspection Capability mission, known as SSPICY. Each has a different task: ASCENT will test two forms of thrust from one fuel supply; SPRITE will make ultraviolet observations; and SSPICY will try to approach and examine defunct spacecraft. NASA’s account of the launch describes objectives and schedules, rather than completed demonstrations.

How ASCENT will test two kinds of propulsion

The ASCENT CubeSat carries one chemical thruster for maneuvers that need greater power and four electrospray thrusters for lower-power operations. NASA says both systems draw on the same supply of Advanced Spacecraft Energetic Non-Toxic propellant. The intended demonstration is whether a small spacecraft can use both propulsion modes without separate fuels and feed systems. NASA describes ASCENT as a low-toxicity propellant that is safer to handle during spacecraft processing than hydrazine. Its stated 50 percent advantage in specific impulse density over conventional propellants such as hydrazine is an agency specification, not a performance result from this flight.

NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center leads the mission with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Georgia Tech and Rubicon Space Systems, a division of Plasma Processes. In a September 30 account of its role, Georgia Tech said students will fly the spacecraft from a mission operations center in Atlanta while working with Marshall. The students trained in ground-station operations, command sequencing and telemetry analysis. Their role extends beyond building the satellite to sending commands and assessing its data during flight.

What SPRITE aims to see in ultraviolet light

SPRITE, developed and operated by the University of Colorado Boulder’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics and funded by NASA’s Astrophysics Division, is designed to detect a range of ultraviolet light that cannot be observed from the ground. NASA calls it the agency’s first astrophysics CubeSat built for that range. Its planned one-year mission will observe star-forming regions and remnants of exploded stars in and near the Milky Way, looking at how gas, dust and high-energy radiation move through galaxies and escape into the space between them.

NASA also hopes those observations will help explain how radiation changed the gas that obscured the early universe. SPRITE is about 13.5 inches long and nine inches wide and high, roughly the size of a shoebox. NASA says its sensitive detectors, mirror coatings and telescope design are intended to make ultraviolet observations possible in that compact package. Whether the spacecraft produces the expected measurements will depend on its work in orbit; the launch itself does not establish a scientific finding.

When SSPICY expects to inspect inactive satellites

For SSPICY, Starfish Space will operate an Otter 24C spacecraft that NASA says is intended to inspect up to four inoperable satellites of U.S. origin in low Earth orbit. The mission will test propulsion and autonomous guidance, navigation and control as Otter approaches the objects. NASA says it aims to collect information about each object’s surface condition, shape and orbital characteristics. The agency also lists a movable robotic boom for directing thrust and computer-vision navigation software among the technologies to be tested.

NASA expects SSPICY’s inspections to begin in 2027 and the mission to operate for about two years. It presents the work as a step toward understanding how spacecraft might eventually inspect, service or help dispose of objects in orbit. Those later uses are possibilities the technology demonstration could inform, not outcomes of this launch. NASA has not identified the satellites Otter will inspect in its launch account or reported that an inspection has begun.

What follows the Transporter-18 launch

The three missions shared a commercial rideshare flight with other government and commercial spacecraft. NASA says that arrangement gives emerging science and technology projects additional opportunities to reach orbit. Its CubeSat Launch Initiative selected ASCENT in 2024 and SPRITE in 2021, offering launch opportunities that let teams gain experience designing, developing and flying spacecraft. The next evidence of progress will come from operations and observations: ASCENT’s propulsion tests, SPRITE’s ultraviolet measurements and SSPICY’s planned inspections. NASA’s launch report does not establish the post-launch health of each spacecraft, successful deployment of each one or completion of those tasks.