29.07.2026

An Electron rocket launches from New Zealand's Mahia Peninsula on April 23, 2026. (Rocket Lab)
Aerospace company Rocket Lab will carry out as many as 18 suborbital launches from Alaska under a $266 million Defense Department contract, expanding the Pentagon’s capacity to test hypersonic and missile-defense technologies. The contract calls for a dozen launches with options for six more from Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska on Kodiak Island, according to a July 21 DOD award notice. Rocket Lab’s first launch from Alaska is slated for the end of this year, the company said in a statement Monday. Launches are expected to continue through 2028. Neither the Pentagon nor Rocket Lab identified the payloads or specific missions involved. The company, however, has been testing a modified version of its Electron rocket capable of carrying suborbital payloads weighing up to 1,500 pounds at speeds exceeding Mach 5. Suborbital vehicles do not enter orbit. Instead, they follow high-speed trajectories that can replicate the flight conditions of ballistic missiles and hypersonic weapons, allowing military agencies to test sensors, interceptors and other defense systems. Two other companies submitted bids for the contract, according to the DOD notice, which did not identify them. Rocket Lab said the award strengthens its position in the military launch market and provides the Pentagon with a high-frequency test capability for missile-defense development. “Cadence, iteration, and relentless execution are essential to maturing America’s missile defense capabilities, and that’s exactly what we bring with launch leadership,” founder and CEO Peter Beck said in his company’s statement.
“The size and scale of this contract reflects the Space Force’s confidence in our ability to meet their urgent national security demands with speed, responsiveness, and scale, and we’re proud to provide the high-frequency launch capacity required to keep the U.S. ahead of global threats,” he added. Found by Beck in New Zealand in 2006 and now headquartered in Long Beach, Calif., Rocket Lab launched its first orbital mission from New Zealand in 2018. The Alaska site will join the company’s launch complex in New Zealand and two facilities in Virginia, giving it access to a wider range of flight paths and missions profiles, according to the statement. Rocket Lab has experience carrying out missions for the U.S. military. In 2019, it launched three Air Force satellites under the service’s Rapid Agile Launch Initiative, which was designed to demonstrate the use of small commercial rockets for military payloads. In March, the company announced a separate four-year Pentagon agreement valued at up to $190 million for as many as 20 suborbital hypersonic test flights. That program, conducted with the Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division, is intended to accelerate the pace of hypersonic flight testing, Rocket Lab said at the time.
Quelle: Stars and Stripes