SpaceX Launches Classified Space Force Payload From Vandenberg on USSF-481
The Falcon 9 lifted off at 5:01 p.m. Thursday from Space Launch Complex 4 East. Its booster, flying for the 28th time, landed on a droneship in the Pacific a little more than eight minutes later.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying a classified payload for the United States Space Force lifted off from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base at 5:01 p.m. PDT on Thursday, Spaceflight Now reported. The mission, designated USSF-481, flew a southerly trajectory after leaving the pad, and neither SpaceX nor the Space Force has disclosed what the payload is.
The liftoff came inside a four-hour launch window that opened at 4:44 p.m. and ran to 8:44 p.m. PT, according to the Ventura County Star. The Star reported before launch that the flight would be the 70th rocket launch of 2026 from Vandenberg, a pace the paper said puts the base on track to pass the 71 launches recorded in 2025.
The Falcon 9 first stage, booster B1081, flew for the 28th time on this mission, a figure reported by Spaceflight Now and by pre-launch coverage in the Ventura County Star and Tech Times. Spaceflight Now reported that a little more than eight minutes after liftoff, B1081 landed on the droneship Of Course I Still Love You in the Pacific Ocean, and put the landing at the 671st Falcon booster landing to date.
Spaceflight Now also reported that USSF-481 is referenced as TH-2 in public notices, the second mission of its kind in as many months, after USSF-259, referenced as TH-1, on Sept. 16. Spaceflight Now said it had asked the Department of the Air Force about the nature of the mission.
Multiple spaceflight outlets reported before launch that the mission could deliver a batch of military satellites to low Earth orbit, the Ventura County Star noted. That remains a report about the likely cargo, not a confirmed manifest, and officials have not confirmed it.
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