NASA’s long-awaited rideshare mission to fly the SPHEREx and PUNCH observatories had been delayed when a last-minute spacecraft malfunction and deteriorating weather forced the mission to be scrubbed. The mission, launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base, was canceled after NASA detected a “SPHEREx ground data-flow issue.”
Besides the technical issue, weather at the California launch pad worsened quickly, lowering the chances of good launch conditions to 5% by the time NASA decided to postpone the mission.
The next launch opportunity comes on Tuesday, March 11, at 8:10 p.m. PDT (11:10 p.m. EDT, 0310 UTC). But weather forecasts call for only a 60% probability of good conditions, and thick clouds are predicted to remain.
A New Era of NASA Rideshare Missions
The SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer) observatory and PUNCH (Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere) mission are NASA’s first rideshare mission under the Science Mission Directorate (SMD).
SMD payloads were previously launched as single-mission dedicated missions by NASA’s Launch Services Program (LSP). But with this new rideshare approach, several science payloads can be launched in a single mission, making it more efficient and cost-effective.
Mark Clampin, the acting deputy associate administrator for SMD, underscored the significance of this strategy.
“We refer to it as a rideshare, and it’s a new approach where we optimize efficiency by launching two payloads simultaneously,” Clampin added. “Not only are we launching two missions, but they’re the full range of NASA’s scientific studies.”
Future Rideshare Missions in the Pipeline
Although this is NASA’s inaugural SMD rideshare of the year, it will not be the last. Julianna Scheiman, SpaceX director of NASA Science Missions, confirmed additional shared missions are in the works.
Later in the year, NASA will send the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) and Tandem Reconnection and Cusp Electrodynamics Reconnaissance Satellites (TRACERS) on another rideshare. IMAP is now aiming for a September 2025 launch, along with NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory and NOAA’s Space Weather Follow-On – Lagrange 1 mission.
As NASA increasingly adopts rideshare launches, the future SPHEREx and PUNCH missions will be a critical proving ground for this budget-friendly approach.
