Firefly Alpha | INCUS
To Be Determined
L - -- : -- : -- : --
The Investigation of Convective Updrafts (INCUS) is a NASA Earth science mission led by Colorado State University that will investigate the behavior of tropical storms in order to better represent these storms in weather and climate models. It consists of 3 SmallSats flying in tight coordination to study why convective storms, heavy precipitation, and clouds occur exactly when and where they form. Each satellite will have a high frequency precipitation radar that observes rapid changes in convective cloud depth and intensities. 1 of the 3 satellites also will carry a microwave radiometer to provide the spatial content of the larger scale weather observed by the radars. By flying so closely together, the satellites will use the slight differences in when they make observations to apply a novel time-differencing approach to estimate the vertical transport of convective mass.
NET October 2026.
Added launch.
Firefly Alpha (Firefly α) is a two-stage orbital expendable launch vehicle developed by the American aerospace company Firefly Aerospace to cover the commercial small satellite launch market. Alpha is intended to provide launch options for both full vehicle and ride share customers.
See Details
NASA Selects Firefly Aerospace to Launch Earth Science Smallsat Trio From Virginia
NASA has selected Firefly Aerospace Inc. of Cedar Park, Texas, to provide the launch service for the agency’s Investigation of Convective Updrafts (INCUS) mission, which aims to understand why, when, and where tropical convective storms fo…
NASA selected Firefly Aerospace to launch a trio of Earth science smallsats that will study the formation of storms. The post NASA to launch Earth science smallsat mission on Firefly Alpha appeared first on SpaceNews.
'Symphony In The Stars' is the first of two dedicated missions on Electron to deploy a single spacecraft to a 650km circular Earth orbit for a confid…
A batch of 27 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.
HawkEye 360 is a a space-based civil global intelligence satellite network using radio frequency (RF) technology to help monitor transportation acros…
A batch of 27 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.
This is a Crew Dragon flight for a private company Axiom Space. The mission will carry a professionally trained commander alongside three private ast…
Dedicated rideshare flight to a sun-synchronous orbit with dozens of small microsatellites and nanosatellites for commercial and government customers.
Project Kuiper is a mega constellation of satellites in Low Earth Orbit that will offer broadband internet access, this constellation will be managed…
A batch of 27 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.
Ku- and Ka-band geostationary communication satellite for China Satcom at 92.2° East, replacing ChinaSat 9.
Unidentified payload for the Russian military.