SpaceX is ready for its last launch of 2022 and you can watch it live online tonight.
A Falcon 9 rocket from SpaceX will send an Israeli imaging Earth satellite into space overnight early Friday (Dec. 30), and you can watch online for free. Liftoff is set for 2:17 a.m. EST (11:17 p.m. PST on Dec. 29 or 0717 GMT) and coverage will be available on SpaceX’s YouTube channel (opens in new tab).
SpaceX will launch the Earth Resources Observation Satellite (EROS)-C3 for the Israel-based company ImageSat International from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. This will be SpaceX’s 61st launch of 2022, nearly doubling the then-record rate of 31 launches set in 2021.
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SpaceX’s Falcon 9 is expected to launch retrograde to (against) the Earth’s rotation and to deploy EROS-C3 in low Earth orbit. The first stage of Falcon 9 will then be commanded to touch down on a drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean, about eight minutes after launch. This will be the 11th flight for the Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage. It previously flew two astronaut flights for NASA, two Starlink missions and six assorted uncrewed commercial and NASA missions.
The EROS-C satellite series “enables defense and intelligence organizations to conduct operations under complete confidentiality and data protection,” according to maker ImageSat International (opens in new tab). It cost about $186 million, according to Spaceflight Now (opens in new tab).
The first-ever EROS satellite, EROS A, was launched in 2000 and reentered Earth’s atmosphere in 2006. Little information is available about the active members of the fleet (EROS-B, EROS-C1 and EROS C2), presumably due to security concerns.
EROS-C3 has a resolution of about one foot (30 centimeters) for greyscale images and two feet (60 cm) for multispectral imagery, according to Everyday Astronaut (opens in new tab). Â By the end of the decade, it will form part of a quartet of EROS satellites that will work alongside two synthetic aperture radar satellites.
Elizabeth Howell is the co-author of “Why Am I Taller (opens in new tab)?” (ECW Press, 2022; with Canadian astronaut Dave Williams), a book about space medicine. Follow her on Twitter @howellspace (opens in new tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or Facebook (opens in new tab).
