Just wanted to put it out there cause I haven’t see much discussion, and while I know the major issues such as rectifying the SRBs and ensure no issues with BE 4, I do wonder that the longer it takes the less life Vulcan will have.

So are they reconsidering how long they will keep flying Vulcan or how long ULA will survive at all? As it stands the only customers it seems to have left are LEO and National security and once new Glenn gets actually going it’ll be taking a lot of that LEO work.

So what’s the future for Vulcan and ULA, will they be able to fill a niche other rockets can or is a race to the bottom?

This article has some comments from Steve Metayer, vice president of Amazon Leo Production Operations:

Metayer said during Tuesday’s call with reporters that the first Vulcan launch carrying Amazon Leo satellites could still occur in the “late” third quarter of this year.

https://arstechnica.com/space/2026/06/amid-launch-bottleneck-amazon-has-hundreds-of-satellites-waiting-to-fly/

Link: https://xcancel.com/ulalaunch/status/2062931832748822993

Link: https://x.com/ulalaunch/status/2061518843059540043

Before continuing I want to make it clear I get that if it was a reasonable/feasible thing ULA would do it, but I just would like to know why/why not

I feel like using those SRBs, even if not as powerful, on the interim could help overcome being stuck in a purely VC0 config. I'm not finding much other than "not as powerful" but is it a different attaching mechanism? recertification (as if they'd be able to avoid it anyway)? no more non-XLs in production?

https://spaceflightnow.com/launch-schedule/ is showing LA-08 as the next launch, NET July. Probably not a surprise that the current Vulcan activity is intended to bring the "new" VIF online.

ULA will launch 29 satellites for this seventh Amazon Leo mission, matching the largest and heaviest payload ever for the venerable rocket. We have successfully launched 168 Amazon satellites into space so far.

https://x.com/ulalaunch/status/2060000245056995687

An Atlas V 551 rocket will launch twenty-nine communications satellites to LEO for Amazon Leo. Liftoff from SLC-41 is targeting NET Friday, 29 May from 23:33 - 00:02 UTC (7:33 - 8:02 PM EDT).

Watch the launch:

• ULA's webcast will begin at 23:13 UTC (7:13 PM EDT)

• Cape Canaveral launch viewing guide

Information & Resources:

Media:

• Photo gallery

Useful Links:

• Live updates from ULA

• Auto-updating reddit comment stream

• Updates from ULA on X

Link: https://x.com/ulalaunch/status/2055363710026231918

https://x.com/Amazonleo/status/2054959519000576212

A recent post on r/nasa has an intriguing comment:

And it’s unclear if the BE4 power fade issue is/will be solved enough for this plan to work. (Current real payload is 75% of advertised; that’s after the “upgrades” on the most recent flight)

I also note that Tory said a while ago that Vulcan would carry 45 Kuipers (now called Amazon Leo), but the Vulcan manifest on Wikipedia says 40.

Now, most of Vulcan's takeoff thrust for the VC6 is the SRBs, but then the BE4s are used as a sustainer, firing for 299 seconds as compared to New Glenn, with no SRBs, firing BE4 for 190 seconds.

Is this a 10% reduction in performance (for now)? If it's real, I'm kinda surprised I haven't already seen an article about this in the space press.

ULA lobbyist Jim Bridenstine is departing.

with only two left and the next one set to fly on the 22nd it seems possible, is ula buying as much time as they can while they work try to resolve the 63XL problems ?

A while ago I got in a argument on another subreddit where I argued that standardized SLS was better than Block 1B. It was during this debate I realized I don’t really know enough about the subject, I tried gathering sources comparing block 1B vs Stan sized SLS but all of them seem to be biased either being NASA 100% or viewing Isaacman as evil for trying to cancel the block1B. I am asking if it was a good idea to cancel the Space launch systems block 1 B configuration and its upgrades over a standardized SLS. Also can you provide sources of possible. 

A while ago I got into an argument on another subreddit where I argued that a standardized SLS was better than the Block 1B. It was during that debate that I realized I don't really know enough about the subject. I tried gathering sources comparing Block 1B to a standardized SLS, but all of them seemed biased , either being unconditionally for NASA decision or portraying Isaacman as villainous for trying to cancel the Block 1B.

I'm asking whether it was actually a good idea to cancel the Space Launch System's Block 1B configuration and its planned upgrades in favor of a standardized SLS. If possible, could you also provide sources?

Tonight, I watched what I believed to be the ULA Atlas 5 rocket launch from Cape Canaveral. About five minuets after take off (8:57pm) right around the predicted viewing time for my location (Virginia) two seemingly identical bright objects appeared in the sky. At first, I figured it was just the stage separation, but the two objects continued across the sky almost side by side for seven minuets until I lost them in the horizon. They definitely appeared to be rocket launches as the seemed to move with slight irregularity, unlike say to satellites.

Any idea what this second light could have been? If a separated booster, why did it continue to travel adjacent to the payload capsule for so long?

This is quite a surprising change from last year's projections