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SpaceX job posts hint at building satellite constellations for US military

SpaceX's first Starlink prototype satellites deploy from Falcon 9. (SpaceX)

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6 years ago

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Published within the last week, unusual SpaceX job postings have begun to combine a range of topics unusual for the company, indicating some level of internal interest in entering into an entirely new industry and mode of operations.

Judging from the job descriptions, SpaceX is looking to hire engineers familiar with integrating third-party payloads onto in-house satellite buses, and they are primarily interested in engineers with Top Secret security clearances.

https://twitter.com/collinkrum/status/1002425606401736704

Given the subtlety of the relevant job postings and the apparent need for high-level security clearances to become involved, it’s extremely difficult to figure out what exactly SpaceX’s goals are. Still, they contain just enough detail to point in the direction of several obvious explanations. These revolve around one industry in particular: satellite operations and sales to or for third parties.

To some extent, these job listings are to be expected: SpaceX has extensive experience building spacecraft (Falcon 9 upper stages and Dragon) explicitly intended for internal use and operations only. Instead, what is surprising about these job listings is the presence of repeated references to “customer payload[s]” in the context of “satellite mission design”, “SpaceX-developed satellite constellations and payload missions”, the “simulation of remote sensing payloads and constellations”, and a need for “on-orbit commissioning” or “activation”.

Put simply, there is no obvious explanation for why SpaceX would need any of those things, at least in the context of the company’s publicly-known activities and business interests. Taken individually, they might be explained by – as described in the same listings – “[SpaceX’s expanding] classified mission manifest”, as it’s well-known that SpaceX is in the process of certifying Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy to launch all practicable Air Force (USAF) and National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) payloads. Those payloads often need to be placed in high-energy orbits that rely on extended upper stage coasts between orbit-raising maneuvers, essentially requiring modifications to Falcon 9’s upper stage such that it becomes a sort of ad-hoc, short-lived satellite.

Starlink spinoffs

However, in all (conceivable) cases where SpaceX might launch a highly-classified payload for a government customer, the dynamic is still precisely that – launch provider (SpaceX) and customer (NRO/USAF/etc). Just like FedEx or UPS have no ownership of or relationship with the goods they transport, satellite launch providers are simply delivering a (very expensive, fragile, and irreplaceable) payload from Point A (the ground) to Point B (orbit). When UPS ships a new smartphone from the manufacturer to the customer, they most certainly do not perform an “in-house commissioning” – if the customer needs help setting up their new phone, they go to the manufacturer or service provider (cell carrier).

In the same way, satellite commissioning is a generally necessary process where the satellite manufacturer – rarely the actual operator or service provider – raises or fine-tunes the expensive spacecraft’s orbit and verifies that all systems and payloads are functioning as intended – only after that process is complete does the manufacturer finally ‘hand off’ the satellite to the customer that paid for it. In some cases, the manufacturer continues to maintain or at least monitor the satellite in the background as the owner serves its own customers, much like how military airplane manufacturers are typically contracted to maintain or support those planes even after final delivery.

Judging from the need for top-secret security clearance in nearly all of these new job postings, SpaceX clearly has a very particular sort of customer in mind. Be it DARPA, NRO, the USAF, or some totally unknown government actor, one or several of the above entities have expressed explicit interest in coopting SpaceX’s newfound status as a prospective dirt-cheap-satellite manufacturer. If that were not the case, SpaceX would not be keen to publish 5+ engineering job postings with top-secret clearance as an explicit prerequisite.

Iridium NEXT satellites form an arc during deployment, December 2017. (SpaceX)

Project Blackjack

Ultimately, it’s undeniable that the prospect of a completed vertically-integrated launch and satellite service provider could be so alluring that entities like the NRO, USAF, or DARPA simply could not pass up the opportunity to at least give it a try. From a purely speculative perspective, the services and processes SpaceX seems to be in the middle of developing are an almost perfect fit with DARPA’s (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) brand new Blackjack program. Perfectly summarized in September by Space News reporter Sandra Erwin,

“[DARPA] wants to buy small satellites from commercial vendors, equip them with military sensor payloads and deploy a small constellation in low-Earth orbit to see how they perform in real military operations.”

DARPA awarded a $1.5M contract to smallsat manufacturer and operator Blue Canyon on in October 2018, small relative to the program’s roughly $118M budget. DARPA has made clear that it plans to finalize multiple contracts with different prospective satellite designers and operators in order to ensure a competitive environment, fuel growth in a fairly new industry, and pave the way for the final procurement of an experimental constellation of 20 satellites by 2021. If successful, it could completely change the way the entire US government procures national security-related satellites, offering a far faster, cheaper, and more flexible route to set up unique capabilities.

For prompt updates, on-the-ground perspectives, and unique glimpses of SpaceX’s rocket recovery fleet check out our brand new LaunchPad and LandingZone newsletters!

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Eric Ralph is Teslarati's senior spaceflight reporter and has been covering the industry in some capacity for almost half a decade, largely spurred in 2016 by a trip to Mexico to watch Elon Musk reveal SpaceX's plans for Mars in person. Aside from spreading interest and excitement about spaceflight far and wide, his primary goal is to cover humanity's ongoing efforts to expand beyond Earth to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

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SpaceX and Elon Musk explain potential reasons for Starship loss

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2 months ago

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January 17, 2025

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Credit: SpaceX

SpaceX and its CEO Elon Musk are starting to shed some light on the potential reasoning for the loss of Starship yesterday, which was lost after a successful launch and catch of the lower-stage booster.

Starship was lost during its ascension, and debris rained down over the Caribbean less than an hour after SpaceX lost all communication with the spacecraft.

A few hours after the launch was over, SpaceX started to shed some light after looking at preliminary data that the rocket left behind.

The company said that a fire developed in the aft section of Starship:

“Following stage separation, the Starship upper stage successfully lit all six Raptor engines and performed its ascent burn to space. Prior to the burn’s completion, telemetry was lost with the vehicle after approximately eight and a half minutes of flight. Initial data indicates a fire developed in the aft section of the ship, leading to a rapid unscheduled disassembly with debris falling into the Atlantic Ocean within the predefined hazard areas.”

Additionally, Musk said that there was some sort of oxygen or fuel leak in the cavity above the ship engine firewall.

The leak was evidently large enough to build more pressure than the vent was able to handle:

Some also seemed to recognize evidence of fires throughout the flight of Starship, which is obviously an anomaly:

There will be more information regarding the loss of Starship in the coming days and weeks, but Musk already believes that a bit of fire suppression and more volume in the cavity above the ship engine firewall could fix the issue.

“Nothing so far suggests pushing next launch past next month,” he said, so Flight 8 could happen sometime in February.

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Please email me with questions and comments at joey@teslarati.com. I’d love to chat! You can also reach me on Twitter @KlenderJoey, or if you have news tips, you can email us at tips@teslarati.com.

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SpaceX completes second catch of lower stage, but loses Starship

Published

2 months ago

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January 16, 2025

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Credit: SpaceX

SpaceX completed its seventh launch of Starship on Thursday, accomplishing a clean liftoff and catch of the first-stage booster. However, the upper stage was lost after its ascent.

The launch took place just a few minutes after 5 p.m. on the East Coast, as the first attempts at getting Starship in the air for the seventh time were delayed by weather both last week and this week.

Conditions were favorable on Thursday as SpaceX looked to follow up a successful campaign by Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’s company, earlier today.

SpaceX went into the seventh Starship launch with plans for a catch attempt of the first-stage booster, something it attempted and completed during the fifth test launch last year. It decided to skip a catch attempt with the sixth test flight as conditions were not aligned.

For now, SpaceX is extremely selective as to when it attempts catches.

However, it was successful during this attempt, its second completed catch:

This flight differed from previous launches as SpaceX rolled out several improvements to the rocket and the processes as it featured plans to do a Starlink deployment simulation and had various adjustments to flap placement and avionics.

These plans were disrupted by the fact that SpaceX lost all communications with Starship about ten minutes into the flight, which the aerospace company confirmed was a result of losing the spacecraft sometime during its ascent.

Although the catch was successful, the loss of the actual rocket seemed to be a huge damper on the entire event. SpaceX confirmed several minutes after the loss of communications that the rocket was destroyed and was lost.

It was its first failure since the second Starship launch in November 2023. SpaceX had no answers for why the rocket was destroyed and lost.

We will keep you updated in the coming days.

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SpaceX confirms next Starship launch target – Here’s when it will take off

Published

2 months ago

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January 9, 2025

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spacex starship upper stage catch
Credit: Elon Musk | X

SpaceX has confirmed a new target date for the seventh Starship test launch after weather in Texas delayed the first scheduled date for “three or four days.”

The company is now targeting the launch for Monday, January 13, at 4 p.m. CST or 5 p.m. EST. The launch date is not set in stone as any variety of delays could impact this, but SpaceX hopes to finally take off after a delay that pushed it back from January 10.

What’s new with this Starship launch

With this being the seventh test launch of Starship, there are several things that the company will change and hope to accomplish. All of these launches are done in preparation for eventually taking flight to Mars, something that will happen next year, according to CEO Elon Musk.

First, SpaceX is rolling out a next-generation ship with “significant upgrades.” Forward flaps have been made smaller and are repositioned away from the heat shield, which will “reduce their exposure to reentry heating.”

SpaceX eyes 25 annual Starship launches starting next year

There is also a 25 percent increase in propellant volume, a new fuel feedline system for the Raptor vacuum engines, and a better-than-ever propulsion avionics module that will control the valves and reading sensors.

Avionics, as a whole, underwent a redesign and now have more capability and redundancy for missions as they become more complex.

Starlink test

SpaceX is also planning to deploy 10 Starlink simulators that are similar in size and weight to the next-generation Starlink satellites:

“While in space, Starship will deploy 10 Starlink simulators, similar in size and weight to next-generation Starlink satellites as the first exercise of a satellite deploy mission. The Starlink simulators will be on the same suborbital trajectory as Starship, with splashdown targeted in the Indian Ocean. A relight of a single Raptor engine while in space is also planned.”

Ship return and catch

There will be several experiments that have to do with returning Starship and various catch scenarios and sequences. One of which will see “a significant number of tiles be removed to stress-test vulnerable areas across the vehicle.”

The ship’s reentry profile was also intentionally designed to test the structural limits of the flaps while at the point of maximum dynamic pressure during reentry.

Currently, SpaceX did not detail whether it would attempt another catch during this test launch. These are usually game-time decisions.

Need accessories for your Tesla? Check out the Teslarati Marketplace:

Please email me with questions and comments at joey@teslarati.com. I’d love to chat! You can also reach me on Twitter @KlenderJoey, or if you have news tips, you can email us at tips@teslarati.com.

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