
The Air Force’s first GPS III space vehicle (SV01) last week has been enclosed within its payload fairing in anticipation of a mid-December launch date.“Vespucci,” as the satellite is known, was encapsulated within a SpaceX-made payload fairing Dec. 7 at Astrotech Space Operations in California, the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center said in a Dec. 10 release. The Lockheed Martin [LMT]-built space vehicle is scheduled to launch Dec. 18 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral…