WASHINGTON — The Space Development Agency (SDA) is restarting launch of it first-generation Tranche 1 Transport Layer satellites following what the agency called a “strategic pause” designed to fix technical problems discovered in the initial 42 birds lofted last year, according to the agency’s top official.
The agency is planning to launch 21 Tranche 1 Transport Layer birds built by York Space Systems Thursday on a SpaceX Falcon 9, Gurpartap “GP” Sandhoo, SDA director and Space Force portfolio acquisition executive for missile warning and tracking, told reporters.
“We have seven more launches in Tranche 1,” he said, for a total of 158 satellites in low Earth orbit ― 126 in the Transport Layer, 28 missile warning/tracking satellites for SDA’s Tracking Layer and four birds equipped with precise sensors to provide fire control data to missile defense interceptors.
Those include three more Tranche 1 Transport Layer launches, which will carry satellites built by Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin. York, Northrop and Lockheed in February 2022 won shares in a $1.8 billion contract award to produce 42 satellites each, creating a constellation that will be able to provide limited region-by-region coverage.
