Ethan Hannigan
Geospatial insights provider Maxar Intelligence launched its fifth and sixth WorldView Legion satellites from Kennedy Space Center in Florida aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Tuesday.
The launch brings the total number of in-orbit Maxar satellites capable of capturing 30 cm-class imagery to seven, the Westminster, Coloirado-based company said Tuesday.
Once all six Worldview Legion satellites go online, the constellation could capture over 5 million square kilometers of Earth imagery daily, 3.6 million of which are 30 cm-class imagery.
“This incredible achievement puts Maxar in a category of its own within the geospatial industry, and it’s been made possible thanks to the hard work, dedication and talent of the many people who have supported this program over the years,” said Dan Smoot, CEO of Maxar Intelligence.
Smoot added that the additional capacity enables the company to collect more timely data covering more areas and advance 2D and 3D geospatial solutions available in the industry.
Increased Capabilities
According to Maxar, the recent launch of the high-resolution Earth imagery and mapping satellites brings additional capacity for mission planning and increased real-time imagery collection capability for various use cases, including emergency response, maritime surveillance, and site monitoring.
In addition to higher collection capacity, the new satellites enable the constellation to power dawn-to-dusk image collection and up to 15 daily revisits of some locations on Earth.
The third and fourth WorldView Legion satellites were deployed in August 2024.
