Watch NRO's spy satellite blast off to space at 1:30PM Eastern
It will be ferried by ULA's Delta-IV Heavy rocket to geosynchronous orbit.
United Launch Alliance (ULA) has a pretty significant launch scheduled for today. It will attempt to send the spy satellite-carrying Delta-IV Heavy rocket to space again after scrubbing its original launch on June 9th due to bad weather. This is only the massive rocket's ninth flight after the first one blasted off in 2004. The Delta-IV Heavy is capable of packing 14,900 pounds of payload and can ferry satellites to geosynchronous orbit. While we know that it's an NRO (National Reconnaissance Office) mission codenamed NROL-37, its other details are actually classified.
NASA Spaceflight believes NROL-37 is carrying an Orion spy satellite that the agency uses to intercept signals in space as part of its intelligence-gathering efforts. Whatever the mission's details are, you'll be able to watch the rocket take off. ULA will stream the launch online starting at 1:31 PM Eastern time today from the launchpad at Cape Canaveral in Florida. You may want to grab some snacks, a book or a game to play while waiting, though. Universe Today warns that ULA is keeping the rocket's exact launch time a secret. It could be shortly after the livestream begins -- the company did say that blastoff is planned for 1:51 PM -- but it could be hours later, as well.
