{"id":197225,"date":"2025-12-17T21:46:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T21:46:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/197225\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T21:46:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T21:46:11","slug":"watch-rocket-lab-launch-4-experimental-disksats-for-the-us-military-tonight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/197225\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch Rocket Lab launch 4 experimental ‘DiskSats’ for the US military tonight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rocket Lab – ‘Don’t Be Such A Square’ Launch – YouTube
\n\"Rocket<\/p>\n

Watch On <\/a><\/p>\n

Rocket Lab will launch a new type of satellite for the U.S. Space Force tonight, and you can watch the action live.<\/p>\n

An Electron<\/a> rocket carrying four “DiskSats” is scheduled to lift off from Rocket Lab<\/a>‘s pad on Wallops Island, Virginia during a window of unspecified length that opens Thursday (Dec. 18) at midnight EST (0500 GMT).<\/p>\n

You can watch the action live here at Space.com, courtesy of Rocket Lab, or directly via the company<\/a>.<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

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\"An\n<\/p>\n

Rocket Lab launches a mission called “The Nation God Navigates” from New Zealand on Nov. 5, 2025. (Image credit: Rocket Lab)<\/p>\n

The upcoming launch, which Rocket Lab calls “Don’t Be Such a Square,” will kick off the Space Test Program (STP)-S30 mission for the U.S. Space Force<\/a>‘s Space Systems Command.<\/p>\n

STP-30 will deploy and operate the first-ever DiskSats, a new type of spacecraft developed by The Aerospace Corporation with funding help from NASA. At 40 inches wide by just 1 inch thick (102 by 2.5 centimeters), each DiskSat has the approximate dimension of a manhole cover.<\/p>\n

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\"four\n<\/p>\n

An illustration of DiskSats being deployed from a small launch vehicle fairing. (Image credit: The Aerospace Corporation)<\/p>\n

That odd shape could lead to greater performance in the final frontier for small satellites, which have traditionally employed the boxy “cubesat<\/a>” form factor.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

DiskSats “could offer more power and surface area for instruments, providing more opportunities for NASA to expand upon target mission objectives for small spacecraft,” agency officials wrote in a description of the new tech<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Breaking space news, the latest updates on rocket launches, skywatching events and more!<\/p>\n

“With its ability to fly continuously with one face pointing at the Earth<\/a>, the DiskSat can also have a very low drag, making them capable of very-low altitude missions (less than 300 kilometers or 185 miles) such as those necessary for some Earth-observation missions,” NASA added.<\/p>\n

The DiskSats won’t be flying so low on their inaugural mission, however. If all goes to plan on “Don’t Be Such a Square,” the Electron will deploy the quartet at an altitude of 342 miles (550 km) about 55.5 minutes after launch, according to Rocket Lab’s mission description<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"side\n<\/p>\n

Rocket Lab technicians prep for the “Don’t Be Such a Square” mission, which will launch four “DiskSats” for the U.S. Space Force. (Image credit: Rocket Lab)<\/p>\n

Rocket Lab initially planned to launch “Don’t Be Such a Square” in April 2026 but expedited it at the Space Force’s request, the company said in an emailed statement.<\/p>\n

The mission will be Rocket Lab’s 20th of 2025, extending the company’s single-year launch record. The previous high was 16, set in 2024. Most of these have been orbital flights of the 59-foot-tall (18 meters) Electron, which gives small satellites dedicated rides to Earth orbit. But three were suborbital missions conducted by HASTE, a modified version of Electron that lets customers test hypersonic technologies<\/a> in the space environment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rocket Lab – ‘Don’t Be Such A Square’ Launch – YouTube Watch On Rocket Lab will launch a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":177939,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[61,60,82,247],"class_list":{"0":"post-197225","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-space"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197225\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/177939"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}