SpaceX spy missions? Yup - looks like it.

[Dr Mordrid]

LA Times ....

SpaceX is opening a DC office, and the LA Times is making a big deal that it's going to be in Chantilly, Va. which is also the home of the National Reconaissance Office (NRO), the agency that launches and operates US spy satellites.

This just as the NRO is starting "the most aggressive launch campaign that the National Reconnaissance Office has had in 20 years."

Wonder if this will end up being a customer for their Falcon 9 Heavy/Heavy H? 32-45 metric tons to LEO and a cargo volume as big as a city bus would make for one helluva spy satellite, or give the ability to put up constellations of smaller satellites with minimal launches.

Falcon 9 Heavy: 3 F9 stages tied together - 27 Merlin engines with a kerosene second stage, and the option of a hydrogen second stage for even higher performance. This thing will make the Delta IV Heavy and the mighty Titan IV look weak - the most powerful US liquid fuel launcher since the Saturn V.

[Dr Mordrid]

Looks like the US military & intelligency agencies really are heading SpaceX's way, especially since the announcement of the monster Falcon Heavy. Such a Darwinian environment could really hurt Lockheed/Boeing's ULA joint venture, which has so far had a monopoly.

Space News....

U.S. Air Force, NASA and NRO Ink Agreement on Launching with SpaceX

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The three biggest U.S. government satellite-buying agencies have concluded a memorandum of agreement to establish rules permitting startup launch-services provider Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) to launch U.S. Air Force and other national security satellites, a U.S. Air Force official said April 14.

Air Force Under Secretary Erin C. Conaton, in a speech delivered to the National Space Symposium here, said the memorandum, signed by the heads of the Air Force, NASA and the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), should be released this summer.

The agreement “is designed to ensure a consistent position on opportunities, certification and requirements for potential new entrants to space launch,” Conaton said in her speech, which in her absence was read by Richard W. McKinney, Air Force deputy under secretary for space programs.

“We expect to release new-entrant criteria by late this summer, and we expect to allow new entrants to compete for near-term launch missions.”
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One U.S. government official agreed that if SpaceX is now allowed to break ULA’s monopoly on U.S. government satellite launches as indicated by the memorandum of agreement, it could force ULA’s already high prices even higher as it eats into ULA’s current market.

“In the longer term we may be faced with questions about whether one of them [ULA or SpaceX] can remain viable without direct subsidies — the same questions we faced with ULA,” this official said. “Then what do we do? We have a policy of assured access to space, which means at least two vehicles. The demand for launches has not increased since ULA was formed, so we could be heading toward a nearly identical situation in a few years. But we are spending taxpayers’ money and if we can find reliable launches that are less expensive, we are not going to ignore that.”