Rocket Lab will launch a Japanese Earth-observing satellite to orbit tonight (Sept. 18), and you can watch the action live.
An Electron rocket carrying a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) spacecraft for the Tokyo-based company Synspective is scheduled to lift off from Rocket Lab's New Zealand site tonight, during a window that opens at 11:15 p.m. EDT (0315 GMT and 3:15 p.m. local time on Sept. 19).
You can watch it live via Rocket Lab starting about 30 minutes before launch. Space.com will stream the webcast here if, as expected, the company makes it available.
SAR satellites can study Earth both night and day and peer through cloudy skies. Synspective is assembling a constellation of such spacecraft in low Earth orbit (LEO), which its calls Strix, after a widespread genus of owls.
The Strix network "provides data for urban development planning, construction and infrastructure monitoring and disaster response" in Japan, Rocket Lab wrote in a mission description.
Rocket Lab has been the sole launch provider for this constellation to date. Tonight's mission will be the 12th the company has performed to build the Strix network, with another 15 on the books in the future.
If all goes according to plan tonight, Electron will deliver the single Strix satellite to LEO, 355 miles (572 kilometers) above Earth, about 53 minutes after liftoff.
Rocket Lab tends to give Synspective launches owl-themed names. Tonight's mission, for example, is called "Owl by the Dozen." It will be Rocket Lab's 17th launch of 2026 and 96th overall.
Most of these flights have been performed by the 59-foot-tall (18 meters) Electron, a two-stage vehicle that gives small satellites dedicated rides to the final frontier. But Rocket Lab also flies a suborbital version of Electron called HASTE, which debuted in June 2023 and now has nine launches under its belt.
The company is also developing a more powerful, partially reusable orbital rocket called Neutron, which could debut late this year or in early 2027.
