Spaceport at Wallops Island, Va., Wins $49 Million Contract With Air Force

Nov. 6–The Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at Wallops Island has won a $49 million contract to launch satellites and space craft for the Air Force over the next five years.

The award is the largest ever received by the spaceport on the Eastern Shore, which is operated by a consortium including Old Dominion University, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the states of Maryland and Virginia.

The Air Force Space and Missiles Systems Center Detachment 12, located at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, N.M., will launch a series of small vehicles from Wallops with payloads of 2,000 pounds to 4,000 pounds. The Air Force also will launch the Peacekeeper-based launch vehicle there. The government is using motors from the former Peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles in new low-cost launch vehicles that can carry satellites into low-Earth orbit.

“It’s a good opportunity for us,” said Billie Reed, associate professor of engineering management at Old Dominion University and director of the Virginia Commercial Space Flight Authority, the consortium that runs the spaceport.

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