SpaceX launching 2nd classified mission for US Space Force in less than a week tonight: Watch it live

a black and white rocket launches into a blue sky from a seaside pad — A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches the classified USSF-153 mission for the U.S. Space Force from California on Sept. 10, 2026. (Image credit: SpaceX)

SpaceX will launch its second classified mission for the U.S. Space Force in less than a week tonight (Sept. 15), and you can watch the action live.

A Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base today, during a four-hour window that opens at 9 p.m. EDT (6 p.m. local California time; 0100 GMT on Sept. 16).

You can watch it live via SpaceX beginning about 10 minutes before launch.

We don't know much about tonight's mission, which is called USSF-259. And we're unlikely to learn much from the webcast, which is expected to end shortly after the Falcon 9's first stage returns to Earth for its drone-ship landing about 8.5 minutes after launch.

That touchdown will be the 13th for this particular booster, which is designated 1097. One of the booster's recent landings was a big milestone for SpaceX. This past April, B1097 pulled off SpaceX's 600th touchdown of an orbital-class rocket, during a launch that sent 25 of the company's Starlink internet satellites to low Earth orbit.

Tonight's mission will be the second that SpaceX flies for the U.S. Space Force in a five-day span: A Falcon 9 launched the similarly classified USSF-153 from Vandenberg on Sept. 10.

Previous Booster 1097 missions

Sentinel-6B | Twilight | NROL-172 | Transporter-17 | 8 Starlink missions

Tonight's launch will be SpaceX's 110th of 2026. The vast majority of the company's flights so far this year — 105 of them, in fact — have been performed by the workhorse Falcon 9.

The powerful Falcon Heavy has launched twice in 2026, as has SpaceX's next-gen megarocket, Starship. Both Starship liftoffs this year have been suborbital test flights. The next Starship launch, which is expected to occur in the next two weeks, will apparently take the vehicle orbital for the first time.

Michael Wall is the Spaceflight and Tech Editor for Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers human and robotic spaceflight, military space, and exoplanets, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, "Out There," was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor's degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.