ULA to prep future Vulcan launch for Amazon despite rocket investigation
United Launch Alliance is running short on usable hardware this year, having to rely on its dwindling supply of Atlas V rockets while it continues an investigation into what went wrong on the last launch of its successor rocket Vulcan.
Its next two launches will be the final Atlas V rockets set aside for commercial customer Amazon.
The first up is targeting May 22 from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 41. The Atlas V is slated to carry up another 29 satellites for the growing broadband internet constellation formerly known as Project Kuiper, but is now named Amazon Leo.
One more Amazon mission could fly in June. After that, ULA has just six remaining Atlas V rockets, but all of those are set aside for launches of Boeing’s Starliner, which has its own issues. With NASA and Boeing working through that spacecraft’s problems, it’s uncertain when it will fly again.
Meanwhile, missions on ULA’s Vulcan, which last launched in February, remain on hold as the company continues to work on why one of the nozzles on its attached solid rocket boosters burned off on liftoff.
That flight was only the fourth time Vulcan had ever launched, but already the second time it had seen issues with the boosters, which are provided by contractor Northrop Grumman.
While Vulcan’s powerful Blue Origin-built BE-4 engines on the main rocket were able to compensate on both missions and get their payloads to orbit, the most recent flight, which was a national security mission, led the Space Force to declare it would no longer launch on Vulcan rockets until the booster issue was solved.
ULA isn’t sitting idle, though, and has begun to prepare for its first Vulcan rocket set aside for Amazon.
The company had already built out a second vertical integration facility that was meant to be a dedicated space to prepare commercial missions at SLC-41, while the original integration facility would be set aside for national security missions.
The new facility, dubbed VIF-A, is expected this week to welcome the first stage for what would be the Vulcan Leo 1 mission.
“While the (solid rocket booster) anomaly investigation continues from the previous Vulcan launch, stacking the vehicle … allows the team to conduct these first-time operations, test the systems and ground support equipment and rollout to the pad for a wet dress rehearsal to be ready for launch once the investigation concludes,” the company announced Monday.
ULA, a shared venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin that was formed in 2006, also noted there are 31 Vulcan rockets in production at its factory in Decatur, Alabama.
Still, ULA’s flight rate this year is taking a hit. Company officials had projected an optimistic 20-24 launches in 2026 after historically slow launch years of late. The company flew only six mission in 2025, five in 2024 and only three in 2023. Its busiest year ever was 16 in 2009.
They had been counting on Vulcan, a successor to both the Atlas V and Delta IV class of rockets, that was originally targeting a debut as early as 2019. But it faced a series of delays due to COVID, the slow development of the BE-4 engines, and even an explosion on a test pad.
It finally took flight in January 2024, but has since not eased into regular use because of the solid rocket booster issues.
The delay in launches means that more than two dozen backlogged Department of Defense missions are on hold on top of dozens more planned commercial launches including those for Amazon. In total, Vulcan has more than 70 launches planned over the next five years in a holding pattern.
Among those, Amazon had contracted for 38 flights on Vulcan to help grow the Amazon Leo constellation to a target of more than 3,200 satellites by 2028.
Vulcan rockets can hold about 45 of the Project Leo satellites vs. the 29 on Atlas V rockets. Amazon had also contracted flights with SpaceX, Arianespace and Blue Origin, with SpaceX to date having flown three missions and Arianespace having flown two. Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket is currently grounded after its own launch issue this year, and has yet to fly a mission for Amazon.
ULA sent up the first two test satellites back in 2023 on the first of nine Atlas V rockets purchased by Amazon. After a year and a half, ULA finally flew the first operational Amazon mission in April 2025. Including that launch ULA has flown six operational Amazon missions, including two in 2026, both of which launched in April.
The upcoming launch would be the seventh, while the eighth and final Atlas V launch could come soon after. The booster and Centaur upper stage for that mission is already at the Cape and awaiting stacking for launch.
Amazon’s constellation for now stands at 302 and will grow to 360 once both remaining Atlas V missions launch.
Until Vulcan gets back to business, with New Glenn still grounded and Ariane 6 missions slow to take flight, Amazon may have to return to SpaceX for help in getting that number to grow anytime soon.
But once Vulcan is cleared, ULA officials have said they expect to ramp up its launch cadence and get to that target of 24 a year.
It just won’t be in 2026.
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This story was originally published May 13, 2026 at 6:11 AM.