Orbital Sciences Corporation was an American company specializing in the design, manufacture and launch of small- and medium- class space and launch vehicle systems for commercial, military and other government customers. In 2014, Orbital merged with Alliant Techsystems to create a new company called Orbital ATK, Inc., which in turn was purchased by Northrop Grumman in 2018. The remnants of the former Orbital Sciences Corporation today are a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman known as Northrop Grumman Space Systems.
MidSTAR-1 is an artificial satellite produced by the United States Naval Academy Small Satellite Program. It was sponsored by the United States Department of Defense (DoD) Space Test Program (STP), and was launched on March 9, 2007 at 03:10 UTC, aboard an Atlas V expendable launch vehicle from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. MidSTAR-1 flew along with FalconSat 3, STPSat 1, and CFESat as secondary payloads; the primary payload was Orbital Express.
The Space Test Program (STP) is the primary provider of spaceflight for the United States Department of Defense (DoD) space science and technology community. STP is managed by a group within the Advanced Systems and Development Directorate, a directorate of the Space and Missile Systems Center of the United States Space Force. STP provides spaceflight via the International Space Station (ISS), piggybacks, secondary payloads and dedicated launch services.
The Active Cavity Radiometer Irradiance Monitor Satellite, or ACRIMSAT was a satellite carrying the ACRIM-3 instrument. It was one of the 21 observational components of NASA's Earth Observing System program. The instrument followed upon the ACRIM-1 and ACRIM-2 instruments that were launched on multi-instrument satellite platforms. ACRIMSAT was launched on 20 December 1999 from Vandenberg Air Force Base as the secondary payload on the Taurus launch vehicle that launched KOMPSAT. It was placed into a high inclination of 98.30°, at 720 km. Sun-synchronous orbit from which the ACRIM-3 instrument monitored total solar irradiance (TSI). Contact with the satellite was lost on 14 December 2013.
The Advanced Research and Global Observation Satellite (ARGOS) was launched on 23 February 1999 carrying nine payloads for research and development missions by nine separate researchers. The mission terminated on 31 July 2003.
TacSat-4 is the third in a series of U.S. military experimental technology and communication satellites. The United States Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) is the program manager. The Office of Naval Research (ONR) sponsored the development of the payload and funded the first year of operations. The Office of the Director of Defense Research and Engineering (DDR&E) funded the standardized spacecraft bus and the Operationally Responsive Space Office (ORS) funded the launch that will be performed by the Air Force's Space and Missile Systems Center (SMC).
Orbcomm is a family of low Earth orbit communications satellites, operated by the United States satellite communications company Orbcomm. As of July 2014, 51 such satellites have orbited Earth, with 50 still continuing to do so.
Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) is an American, privately held aerospace and national security contractor specializing in aircraft modification and integration, space components and systems, and related technology products for cybersecurity and health. The company contracts with the United States Armed Forces, NASA, and private spaceflight companies. SNC is headquartered in Sparks, Nevada and has 33 locations in 19 U.S. states, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Turkey.
Orbiting Vehicle or OV, originally designated SATAR, comprised five disparate series of standardized American satellites operated by the US Air Force, launched between 1965 and 1971. Forty seven satellites were built, of which forty three were launched and thirty seven reached orbit. With the exception of the OV3 series and OV4-3, they were launched as secondary payloads, using excess space on other missions. This resulted in extremely low launch costs and short proposal-to-orbit times. Typically, OV satellites carried scientific and/or technological experiments, 184 being successfully orbited through the lifespan of the program.
The O/OREOS is an NASA automated CubeSat nanosatellite laboratory approximately the size of a loaf of bread that contains two separate astrobiology experiments on board. Developed by the Small Spacecraft Division at NASA Ames Research Center, the spacecraft was successfully launched as a secondary payload on STP-S26 led by the Space Test Program of the United States Air Force on a Minotaur IV launch vehicle from Kodiak Island, Alaska on 20 November 2010, at 01:25:00 UTC.
Fast, Affordable, Science and Technology Satellite-Huntsville 01 or FASTSAT-Huntsville 01 of the NASA. FASTSAT-HSV 01 was flying on the STP-S26 mission - a joint activity between NASA and the U.S. Department of Defense Space Test Program, or DoD STP. FASTSAT and all of its six experiments flying on the STP-S26 multi-spacecraft/payload mission have been approved by the Department of Defense Space and Experiments Review Board (USA-220).
SpaceX CRS-1, also known as SpX-1, was SpaceX's first operational cargo mission to the International Space Station, under their Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-1) contract with NASA. It was the third flight for the uncrewed Dragon cargo spacecraft, and the fourth overall flight for the company's two-stage Falcon 9 launch vehicle. The launch occurred on 8 October 2012 at 00:34:07 UTC.
The Rocket City Space Pioneers (RCSP) was one of 29 teams from 17 different countries officially registered and in the competition for the Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP) during 2010–2012.
The EELV Secondary Payload Adapter (ESPA) is an adapter for launching secondary payloads on orbital launch vehicles.
The Laser Communications Relay Demonstration (LCRD) is a NASA mission that will test laser communication in space for extremely long distances, between Earth and geosynchronous orbit.
Secondary payload, also known as rideshare payload, is a smaller-sized payload transported to orbit on a launch vehicle that is mostly paid for—and with the date and time of launch and the orbital trajectory determined—by the entity that contracts and pays for the primary launch. As a result, the secondary payload typically obtains a substantially reduced price for transportation services to orbit, by accepting a trade off of the loss of control once the contract is signed and the payload is delivered to the launch vehicle supplier for integration to the launch vehicle. These tradeoffs typically include having little or no control over the launch date/time, the final orbital parameters, or the ability to halt the launch and remove the payload should a payload failure occur during ground processing prior to launch, as the primary payload typically purchases all of these launch property rights via contract with the launch services provider.
SHERPA is a commercial satellite dispenser developed by Andrews Space, a subsidiary of Spaceflight Industries, and was unveiled in 2012. The maiden flight was on 3 December 2018 on a Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket, and it consisted of two separate unpropelled variants of the dispenser.
ArgoMoon is a CubeSat that will launch into a heliocentric orbit on Artemis 1, the maiden flight of the Space Launch System. The objective of the ArgoMoon spacecraft is to take detailed images of the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage following Orion separation, an operation that will demonstrate the ability of a cubesat to conduct precise proximity maneuvers in deep space.
The Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe(IMAP) is a heliophysics mission that will simultaneously investigate two important and coupled science topics in the heliosphere: the acceleration of energetic particles and interaction of the solar wind with the local interstellar medium. These science topics are coupled because particles accelerated in the inner heliosphere play crucial roles in the outer heliospheric interaction. In 2018, NASA selected a team led by David J. McComas of Princeton University to implement the mission, which is currently planned to launch in February 2025. IMAP will be a Sun-tracking spin-stabilized satellite in orbit about the Sun–Earth L1 Lagrange point with a science payload of ten instruments. IMAP will also continuously broadcast real-time in-situ data that can be used for space weather prediction.
Cygnus NG-16, previously known as Cygnus OA-16, was the sixteenth flight of the Northrop Grumman robotic resupply spacecraft Cygnus and its fifteenth flight to the International Space Station (ISS) under the Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-2) contract with NASA. The mission was launched on 10 August 2021 at 22:01:05 UTC, for a (planned) 90-day mission at the ISS. This was the fifth launch of Cygnus under the CRS-2 contract.
