Space Force Awards Rocket Lab $266 Million for Suborbital Launches from Alaska
The U.S. Space Force has awarded Rocket Lab a $266 million contract to conduct 12 suborbital missions over three years, most from a new launch pad at the Pacific Spaceport Complex in Kodiak, Alaska. This is Rocket Lab's largest launch deal to date and includes options for six additional missions. The launches will support missile defense and hypersonic testing, likely using the HASTE variant of the Electron rocket. The Alaska site provides access to unique high-inclination, polar, and sun-synchronous orbits. The contract is part of the Space Force's Rocket System Launch Program and aligns with efforts to ease congestion at Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg by offloading smaller launches to commercial spaceports. Rocket Lab is also developing the larger Neutron rocket for medium- and heavy-class missions.
Editorial responsibility
- No named human review is recorded for this page.
- Reports are grouped by semantic similarity and deterministic rules. Language models may assist titles, summaries, translation and cross-source analysis; the page itself is projected from evidence records.
- Current automated evidence projection