A Rocket Lab Electron rocket launches the "Daughter of the Stars" mission for the European Space Agency on March 28, 2026.
(Image credit: Rocket Lab)
Rocket Lab will launch a Japanese Earth-observing radar satellite to orbit tonight (June 30), and you can watch the action live.An Electron rocket carrying the QPS-SAR-13 satellite is scheduled to lift off from Rocket Lab's New Zealand site tonight at 9 p.m. EDT (0100 GMT and 1 p.m. local New Zealand time on July 1).You can watch the launch live via Rocket Lab, with coverage beginning about 30 minutes before liftoff. Space.com will carry the stream as well, if the company makes it available.Japan-based iQPS is building a constellation of 36 satellites in low Earth orbit that study Earth using high-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR). SAR spacecraft can peer through clouds and gather data at night as well as during the day.Tonight's launch, which Rocket Lab calls "The Grain Goddess Provides," will be the eighth, out of a total of 15, that it will perform to assemble iQPS' constellation.If all goes according to plan tonight, Electron will deploy the iQPS satellite — which is nicknamed Mikura-I, after a Japanese goddess associated with abundance and prosperity — about 50 minutes after liftoff, into a circular orbit 357 miles (575 kilometers) above Earth.
