In theory, developing a spacecraft that will fly to Mars, insert itself into orbit around the red planet, and relay transmissions back and forth to large satellite dishes on Earth is a relatively straightforward proposition.
NASA's procurement of a "Mars Telecommunications Network" spacecraft, however, has turned out to be one of the most engrossing dramas of the year for the US space agency.
The agency finally reached a decision earlier this month, selecting Blue Origin to develop, launch, and operate a $700 million spacecraft at Mars. However, the main competitor for the award, Rocket Lab, was not happyβat all. On Friday, the company filed a protest of NASA's decision with the US Government Accountability Office.
In theory, developing a spacecraft that will fly to Mars, insert itself into orbit around the red planet, and relay transmissions back and forth to large satellite dishes on Earth is a relatively straightforward proposition.
NASA's procurement of a "Mars Telecommunications Network" spacecraft, however, has turned out to be one of the most engrossing dramas of the year for the US space agency.
The agency finally reached a decision earlier this month, selecting Blue Origin to develop, launch, and operate a $700 million spacecraft at Mars. However, the main competitor for the award, Rocket Lab, was not happyβat all. On Friday, the company filed a protest of NASA's decision with the US Government Accountability Office.
Defense aviation company Hermeus has announced the development of Ramjet-X, its next-generation ramjet propulsion test vehicle capable of carrying test payloads to high Mach speeds.
The company said Ramjet-X, designed to launch mid-flight from a carrier aircraft, offers the key advantages of competitive high-Mach test platforms while keeping costs low enough for a wider range of mission profiles.
Pre-flight testing of Ramjet-X is already underway, with its first official prototype test flights expected in 2027.
Ramjet-X Will Launch Mid-Flight from Quarterhorse
Most conventional jet engines canβt achieve supersonic speeds without dumping raw fuel into an afterburner and literally rocketing past the sound barrier. To travel at high Mach speeds without relying on rocket-style propulsion, engineers have turned to ramjet engines.
While ramjets are effective, they rely on the high-speed influx of air to operate. This limitation means aircraft equipped with this type of propulsion must be propelled to higher speeds by another craft or booster rocket before they can engage.
High-Mach Ramjet propulsion requires rapid air influx to enable combustion. Image Credit: Hermeus
In an email to The Debrief, a Hermeus spokesperson explained that current options often rely on βlarge and expensiveβ boosters that are discarded after each test. Conversely, Ramjet-X relies on the companyβs reusable aircraft to reach launch velocity.
βRamjet-X is designed to be carried by Quarterhorse, which provides the speed and altitude required for deployment,β the company told The Debrief.
Ramjet-X is launched by Quarterhorse mid-flight. Image Credit: Hermeus
The company could not disclose what speed Quarterhorse must achieve before it can launch Ramjet-X. However, the spokesperson did note that the launch craft is designed to return to home base for future missions.
When asked about Ramjet-Xβs specific operating velocity once it disengages from Quarterhorse and engages its ramjet propulsion system, the company could only say the vehicle will operate at βHigh-Mach speeds.β
Conventional ramjets use a combination of high-velocity air and fuel to achieve extreme velocities. Hermeus said they cannot disclose specifics about Rocket-Xβs fuel requirements.
Mission Profiles and Repeatable Architecture
Because of the sensitive nature of potential future missions, Hermeus was cautious about sharing specifics of any planned missions. The company also couldnβt provide technical details on what a typical mission profile might look like.
However, a Hermeus spokesperson told The Debrief, the vehicleβs architecture βallows customers and partners to integrate payloads, sensors, communications and computer systems, autonomy, material samples, propulsion technologies, and other experimental hardware and software onto Ramjet-X for testing in representative sustained high-Mach conditions.β
Ramjet-X will enable βhigh-Machβ tests. Image Credit: Hermeus
Hermeus also highlighted the potential cost savings of a βrepeatable platform, launch architecture, and flight-test infrastructure,β designed to dramatically lower costs without sacrificing versatility or reliability.
βInstead of relying on a large dedicated expendable booster to accelerate the test vehicle into its ramjet operating regime, the launch aircraft provides much of that energy and then returns to fly again,β the company told The Debrief. βThis architecture allows Hermeus to fly more by reducing the cost of expendable launch hardware.β
βHigh-speed flight testing is extremely expensive, and you donβt get many shots at it,β Hermeus CEO Zach Shore explained.
βAnother Order of Magnitude Reductionβ
Hermeus said specific unit costs are not currently available. However, they said a projected cost per minute of high-Mach test time βis in the low $100kβs per minute.β For comparison, the company highlighted the historic and current costs of high-Mach flight testing.
βMost of the below comparisons are rocket-based but will give you an idea how costly high-Mach tests are and why Ramjet-X will fundamentally change the equation,β Hermeus told The Debrief.
Older examples include NASAβs X-43, which achieved around 21 seconds of high-Mach flight, and the Air Forceβs X-51, which achieved around 350 seconds. Hermeus said both multi-year efforts cost around $450 million each in todayβs dollars.
Current options include rocket-powered test flights aboard Rocket Labβs HASTE, which Hermeus said run $10-20 million each, βnot including the expendable cruise or glide vehicles.β The company also pointed to Stratolaunch Talon-A missions.
βEven though fully reusable, (they) are $10-12m per flight for a few min of on-condition time,β the company told The Debrief.
Conversely, Hermeus said its current projections of less than a million per minute offer potential customers βanother order of magnitude reduction in the problem that matters most.β
βRamjet-X is being designed around simplified manufacturing, rapid production, and expendability in meaningful quantities rather than the traditional model of building a small number of highly bespoke high-speed test articles as was done in other high-speed airbreathing flight test programs like X-43 and X-51,β the company told The Debrief.Β
Development of Ramjet-X is already well underway
When detailing the newly announced Ramjet-Xβs benefits, Shore noted that their system gives them a way to place new systems into sustained high-Mach environments βwithout building an expensive one-off test program every time.β
βBringing speed, sustained flight, and scalability all into one system lowers the barriers to gathering extremely valuable data from these conditions and accelerates programs for both us and our customers,β the Hermeus CEO explained.
When announcing Ramjet-X, Hermeus said the vehicleβs ramjet engine is already undergoing extensive testing at its Florida-based HEAT facility. Future tests will occur at the companyβs California headquarters, with the first flight tests planned for 2027.Β
Christopher Plain has spent the last six years as Associate News Editor and Head Science Reporter at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his novels at plainfiction.com, or email him at christopher@thedebrief.org.
Private space launch services company Rocket Lab has unveiled its GHOST (Global Hypersonic & Orbital Spaceport Technology) self-contained mobile launch system, capable of placing payloads in orbit or enabling suborbital launches from virtually anywhere on Earth.
Designed to accommodate the companyβs Electron and HASTE rockets, the company said GHOSTβs βlaunch-anywhere, launch-anytimeβ capability can support multi-launch flight campaigns for commercial applications. Rocket Lab said the systemβs versatility also offers benefits for βcriticalβ national security missions.
GHOST Private Space Launch System Fits Into Standard Shipping Containers
Now, Rocket Lab says the company has created an all-in-one launch solution called GHOST that can accommodate rocket launches from seemingly anywhere.
For example, when announcing the formal unveiling of GHOST, the company said the entire system can be packaged in standard shipping containers. This includes all the hardware to launch complete rockets and the ground support infrastructure needed to complete single-launch missions or multi-launch campaigns.
Perhaps most critically, the system can be shipped to any destination for customized launch services worldwide. If the already scheduled real-world inaugural launches prove the claims, that launch-location versatility could give Rocket Lab a technological edge over its private space launch competitors.
Two New Alaska Launch Pads Will Provide the System its First Real-World Test
When unveiling GHOST, Rocket Lab also announced its first launch site. Dubbed Rocket Lab Complex 4, GHOSTβs new home will be at the Pacific Spaceport Complex at Kodiak, Alaska. The company said this inaugural site will include two distinct launch pads for βhigh-frequency launch campaigns.β
The new site will join the already operational Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand and Launch Complexes 2 and 3 in Virginia. The company said that taken together, Rocket Lab now controls six total launch pads βacross two hemispheres.β Along with its reported mobility, the company emphasized GHOSTβs ability to accommodate both Electron and HASTE.
βGHOST delivers a dual-launch capability across new locations, allowing Rocket Lab to expand the mission profiles of both vehicles and meet increasing international demand for orbital and suborbital sovereign launch capability,β the company explained.
Rocket Lab also said that the mobile launch platform is βpurpose-built to support responsive launch needs and time-critical national security missions, enabling rapid site activation and simultaneous launch possibilities.β
The company expects to conduct its first GHOST-supported launch from Launch Complex 4 in 2027, including launches announced in July for the U.S. Space Force.
βThe size and scale of this contract reflects the Space Forceβs confidence in our ability to meet their urgent national security demands with speed, responsiveness, and scale, and weβre proud to provide the high-frequency launch capacity required to keep the U.S. ahead of global threats,β company CEO Sir Peter Beck said at the time of the announcement.
βLeading the Field in Small Launch for Missile Defense and National Securityβ
After noting that Rocket Lab has been βleading the field in small launch for missile defense and national security for years,β Sir Beck heralded GHOSTβs seemingly sci-fi-sounding ability to launch a rocket into space from virtually anywhere in the world as another example of the launch service reliability and repeatability.
βCreating GHOST is about packaging that up into a deployable system that can serve the worldβs most important programs from wherever those missions need,β Sir Beck said. βWhether itβs for missile defense and deterrence, or opening up more trajectories, orbital missions, and sovereign launch capabilities in allied nations, GHOST is the answer to launching anywhere, anytime, and without compromise.β
Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and has spent the last six years as Associate News Editor and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him at christopher@thedebrief.org.
Rocket Lab warned that the chances of launching its Neutron rocket for the first time before the end of the year are βnarrowingβ despite progress on the vehicleβs development.
Kepler Communications plans to deploy next-generation optical relay satellites on Rocket Labβs upcoming Neutron rocket in one of several launches the Canadian operator has slated for 2028.
An ongoing military exercise happening hundreds of miles above Earth hasβfor the first time in an unclassified settingβdemonstrated how future satellites might evade and pursue one another in a future conflict.
That was the announcement Wednesday from True Anomaly, one of the companies involved in the exercise. True Anomaly's Jackal satellite, also known as Panther, played the cat-and-mouse game with another spacecraft named Puma, based on Rocket Lab's Pioneer satellite platform.
"This is what we've really been building towards for the past four years," said Even Rogers, True Anomaly's co-founder and CEO.
An ongoing military exercise happening hundreds of miles above Earth hasβfor the first time in an unclassified settingβdemonstrated how future satellites might evade and pursue one another in a future conflict.
That was the announcement Wednesday from True Anomaly, one of the companies involved in the exercise. True Anomaly's Jackal satellite, also known as Panther, played the cat-and-mouse game with another spacecraft named Puma, based on Rocket Lab's Pioneer satellite platform.
"This is what we've really been building towards for the past four years," said Even Rogers, True Anomaly's co-founder and CEO.
It seems as though $5.6 billion wasn't enough. That was the news from the US Space Force on Friday, when military officials announced they were tripling the maximum value of one of the service's National Security Space Launch contracts to $17 billion.
The expansion of the Space Force's National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 3 contract comes as the Pentagon signals rising demand for military satellite launches. The NSSL program is set up to allow Space Systems Command, which oversees the Space Force's launch program, to select from a pool of launch providers for individual missions to deliver the military's satellites to orbit.
The NSSL program has two parts. Lane 1 covers the Space Force's more risk-tolerant missions, such as medium-lift launches with experimental payloads or rideshare missions carrying satellites for the Pentagon's surveillance or data relay constellations. Lane 2 includes higher-priority strategic missions, like the government's largest and most expensive spy satellites, or radiation-hardened communications satellites designed to survive a nuclear war.
It seems as though $5.6 billion wasn't enough. That was the news from the US Space Force on Friday, when military officials announced they were tripling the maximum value of one of the service's National Security Space Launch contracts to $17 billion.
The expansion of the Space Force's National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 3 contract comes as the Pentagon signals rising demand for military satellite launches. The NSSL program is set up to allow Space Systems Command, which oversees the Space Force's launch program, to select from a pool of launch providers for individual missions to deliver the military's satellites to orbit.
The NSSL program has two parts. Lane 1 covers the Space Force's more risk-tolerant missions, such as medium-lift launches with experimental payloads or rideshare missions carrying satellites for the Pentagon's surveillance or data relay constellations. Lane 2 includes higher-priority strategic missions, like the government's largest and most expensive spy satellites, or radiation-hardened communications satellites designed to survive a nuclear war.
Welcome to Edition 9.01 of the Rocket Report! Back in January, I wrote about the 20 launches and landings we were most excited about in 2026. The list included things that were, at the time, officially scheduled to occur this year. I also gave my own view of the probability of each of these events actually happening before December 31. Halfway through the year, we can only count one of the events as completed, and that was NASA's Artemis II mission in April. Many are now scheduled for next year, proving again that delays are a constant in theΒ space industry. A couple of themβsuch as the launch of NASA's Roman Space Telescopeβdo appear to be on track to happen soon.
As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets, as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
Swift Boost Mission reaches orbit. A pioneering commercial mission to reboost the orbit of NASA's Swift astronomy satellite launched early Friday after attempts earlier in the week were thwarted by bad weather and a technical issue. The Link servicing satellite developed by Katalyst Space Technologies soared to orbit on the tip of a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket that dropped from the belly of a modified L-1011 jetliner over the remote Pacific Ocean. Mission managers called off two launch attempts Tuesday and Wednesday due to poor weather around the L-1011's staging base on Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. On Thursday, "a launch vehicle issue temporarily prevented teams from deploying the rocket" after takeoff of the L-1011.
Rocket Lab quietly launched a small satellite from New Zealand on Friday in a high-flying military exercise to test the US Space Force's ability to rapidly respond to a crisis in low-Earth orbit.
The launch was scarcely announced in advance. The only public indication of an impending launch was the release of a warning for pilots and sailors to steer clear of the rocket's flight path. Rocket Lab did not provide a livestream of the launch, as it does for most of its missions. As of Monday morning, officials from Rocket Lab and the Space Force had not acknowledged the launch in any official public statements.
But the US military's catalog of space objects was updated over the weekend to reflect the launch. A new satellite, designated Victus Haze Puma, showed up in the catalog with a launch date of Friday from Rocket Lab's privately run spaceport at MΔhia Peninsula in New Zealand. The Space Force cataloged the spacecraft in a polar orbit ranging between 215 miles and 286 miles (347-by-461 km), with an inclination of about 97.5 degrees from the equator.
Rocket Lab quietly launched a small satellite from New Zealand on Friday in a high-flying military exercise to test the US Space Force's ability to rapidly respond to a crisis in low-Earth orbit.
The launch was scarcely announced in advance. The only public indication of an impending launch was the release of a warning for pilots and sailors to steer clear of the rocket's flight path. Rocket Lab did not provide a livestream of the launch, as it does for most of its missions. As of Monday morning, officials from Rocket Lab and the Space Force had not acknowledged the launch in any official public statements.
But the US military's catalog of space objects was updated over the weekend to reflect the launch. A new satellite, designated Victus Haze Puma, showed up in the catalog with a launch date of Friday from Rocket Lab's privately run spaceport at MΔhia Peninsula in New Zealand. The Space Force cataloged the spacecraft in a polar orbit ranging between 215 miles and 286 miles (347-by-461 km), with an inclination of about 97.5 degrees from the equator.
Login
