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Rocket Report: A rare Falcon 9 scrub; is it just about Vulcan’s time to shine?

October 9, 2026

Welcome to Edition 9.14 of the Rocket Report! The big news this week, from our perspective, is that United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan rocket appears to be close to launching. We’ve seen a no-earlier-than launch date for the return to flight mission of October 29 (an Amazon Leo flight), and the next rocket up after that, also an Amazon Leo mission, is also planned for this year. Assuming the solid rocket boosters work, Vulcan could be poised for a major breakthrough next year in cadence.

As always, we welcome reader submissions, and 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.

Nuri rocket notches another success. South Korea successfully deployed five satellites for its first domestically launched microsatellite constellation during the fifth flight of its homegrown Nuri rocket Wednesday, Yonhap News Agency reports. In addition to the primary payload of five New-space Earth Observation Satellite Constellation for National Safety microsatellites, nine of the rocket’s 10 CubeSat secondary payloads were released as planned, according to the Korea AeroSpace Administration. PERSAT-02, developed by South Korean startup Quaternion, failed to separate from the rocket.

Pushing for more commercial activity … The mission was Nuri’s fourth consecutive success after its debut flight failed in 2021, raising the small-lift rocket’s overall launch success rate to 80 percent. After the launch, Science Minister Bae Kyung-hoon pledged continued government support for additional launches led by the private sector as South Korea seeks to shift from a government-led space development model toward a more commercially driven industry.

HyImpulse test flight slips into 2027. German launch startup HyImpulse has pushed the second flight of its SR75 suborbital rocket into spring 2027, European Spaceflight reports. As recently as last month, the company had said the flight would occur at the “end of 2026.” HyImpulse said the new target was based on its assessment of the remaining activities required under the license framework and the seasonal weather conditions at SaxaVord, rather than on the vehicle’s readiness.

This will be the rocket’s first flight from European soil … The flight from SaxaVord will be HyImpulse’s second SR75 mission and its first to carry commercial payloads. The company completed an initial test flight of the suborbital rocket on 3 May 2024 from the Koonibba Test Range in South Australia.

German launch company gets a new CEO. The Supervisory Board of Rocket Factory Augburg has appointed Alexander Dahm as CEO. He succeeds Indulis Kalnins and will be responsible for the company’s continued development and its path to the debut flight of the RFA ONE launch vehicle, the company said this week. Dahm has 30 years of aerospace experience, including involvement with the Ariane 5 program.

Still seeking orbit … “I am impressed by the grit, innovative strength, and passion with which a new generation of European launch vehicles is being developed here. Together, we will reach the next important milestones on the way to the maiden flight of RFA ONE and actively shape the company’s future,” Dahm said. RFA has been working toward its first orbital launch following the loss of its first stage during a 2024 static-fire test.

SpaceX has rare scrub of Falcon 9 late in countdown. A Falcon 9 launch planned for early Monday morning was scrubbed in the final minute of the count as the rocket was shifting into its automated startup sequence, Spaceflight Now reports. SpaceX didn’t provide a reason for the abort. The rocket is intended to launch a new batch of data satellites to low Earth orbit on behalf of the United States Space Force’s Space Development Agency.

A relatively young booster … The company targeted Tuesday, October 6, for its next launch attempt, but waived off that opportunity as well. Following additional changes, the company is now aiming for no earlier than Saturday, October 10. The mission will use Falcon 9 first stage booster B1103. This will be its sixth flight following the launches of the SDA’s T1TL-E, NROL-179, and three batches of Starlink satellites.

Europe’s progress on hop tests remains slow. The European Commission has extended the deadline for the SALTO reusable launcher project to the end of 2026, giving the program another three months to complete the first hop test of Europe’s Themis reusable rocket demonstrator, European Spaceflight reports. This is the latest in a series of extensions that have pushed the completion date back from the original November 2025 deadline.

A long wait … The ArianeGroup-led SALTO initiative is an €42.8 million EU research project that is part of the ESA-managed Themis program. SALTO comprises the first two low-altitude hop tests, with the aim of demonstrating that Themis can be launched, recovered, and then launched again. Themis arrived at Esrange, Sweden, in June 2025, following a two-week road journey from ArianeGroup’s Les Mureaux facility in France. It has since been doing something important while not launching or hopping, we presume.

Concerns about credit risks at SpaceX. SpaceX plans to raise $40 billion in debt to finance the purchase of Nvidia chips, and The Financial Times reports that this has raised concerns about the large company’s creditworthiness. The publication reports that the spread on SpaceX’s five-year credit default swaps rose to 194 basis points on Wednesday, meaning it now costs $19,400 annually to protect $1 million of its debt against default.

Doubling down on Nvidia … As for the $40 billion in new debt, private capital firm Apollo was expected to lead the deal, while bond giant Pimco was among lenders in talks to fund it. It comes after the company issued $25 billion in investment-grade debt in June just weeks after raising $86 billion in its initial public offering. The new debt deal suggests SpaceX founder Elon Musk is doubling down on his bet on Nvidia’s technology.

Cape Canaveral to get drone protection. Cape Canaveral Space Force Station is getting lasers that can zap drones intruding into its airspace, TWZ reports. When installed, the new directed energy defense system will be part of a much larger effort to protect the spaceport against drone incursions. The idea is to ensure launch safety and keep prying eyes away from an installation full of secrets about America’s military and commercial space efforts.

Next step: sharks with laser beams? … Companies like SpaceX, United Launch Alliance, Blue Origin, and Relativity Space use the installation for space launches. The base defense modernization effort comes as the Cape Canaveral region is inundated with drone incursions. There were hundreds last year. For the spaceport, lasers are even more important than for other locations needing drone protection. That’s because the traditional method of jamming radio frequencies to interfere with drone connections to controllers could damage space vehicles. (submitted by biokleen)

Vulcan stacking two launches for Amazon. In a wide-ranging interview with Ars, Amazon Leo officials discussed their progress toward delivering an orbital broadband service to customers back on Earth. Among the challenges faced by the company was launch. “From day one we decided to go with a diverse set of partners to supply us with rockets,” Amazon Leo VP Rajeev Badyal said. “We started off with ULA, Blue Origin, Arianespace, and SpaceX. We signed deals with all four of them. We knew there was risk, but we had to get heavy lift vehicles.”

Vulcan on deck … Badyal said the company is currently working on back-to-back launches on Vulcan this year. “I can say we’re weeks away from launching on Vulcan,” he said. “Things are on track. We’ll follow that with an Arianespace launch and at least one more Vulcan this year. I can also tell you the infrastructure that we put and built with ULA now allows us to process two rockets simultaneously. So right now, there are two vehicle integration facilities, and both have a Vulcan rocket that is vertical and getting ready for our missions.”

Blue Origin building three more pads. In an interview with Fox News this week, Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos said the company was going to construct three more launch pads after the rebuild of LC-36A to accommodate New Glenn. “We’re building three more pads,” Bezos said. “So we’re building—we’ll have a total of four pads that we’re under construction right now.” Bezos said this in the context of the company’s recent request to the FAA for 50 launches a year from Florida.

Bezos has much bigger goals long-term … “Our goal is to fly every day,” Bezos said. “And then once we’re flying every day, we want to fly every hour. And then once we’re flying every hour, we want to fly every minute. And by the way, that’s where I lose the team.” Bezos has long talked about making spaceflight routine, but launches every minute seems a tad ambitious for a company that has yet to launch once a month.