The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has rescinded limitations concerning the timing of commercial launches, which were initially implemented due to the government shutdown’s impact on airspace management. On November 16, the FAA declared the cancellation of an emergency order, which had been issued ten days prior. This order had placed restrictions on activities within the National Airspace System (NAS).
These restrictions arose from increased absenteeism among air traffic controllers who hadn’t received payment since early October because of the shutdown. The order primarily aimed to reduce the number of commercial aircraft flights at 40 major U.S. airports, but it also constrained commercial launches at U.S. spaceports to the hours between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. local time.
“Today’s decision to rescind the order reflects the steady decline in staffing concerns across the NAS and allows us to return to normal operations,” stated FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford in an agency announcement.
Following the shutdown's conclusion with the signing of a spending bill on November 12, the FAA started to reduce the cuts to commercial flights. However, the restrictions on commercial launches remained until the entire order was revoked. The order significantly affected SpaceX’s Transporter-15 rideshare mission, which was initially scheduled for November 11 at 10:18 a.m. local time from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. SpaceX postponed the launch, rescheduling it for November 19 at the same time. SpaceX also adjusted the launch times of three other Falcon 9 missions carrying Starlink satellites to after 10 p.m. local time in Florida.
United Launch Alliance (ULA) similarly modified the Atlas 5 launch of ViaSat-3 F2 to lift off shortly after 10 p.m. Eastern on November 13. The order did allow the FAA to issue waivers in specific cases. Blue Origin obtained a waiver for the New Glenn launch of NASA’s ESCAPADE Mars mission on the afternoon of November 13, as rescheduling it after 10 p.m. wasn’t possible.
The order only applied to commercial launches licensed by the FAA. The Falcon 9 launch of the Sentinel-6B satellite from Vandenberg, which occurred at 9:21 p.m. local time on November 16 (12:21 a.m. Eastern November 17), was exempt because it wasn’t an FAA-licensed commercial mission. “This mission is a government mission, so it did not require FAA licensing,” said Tim Dunn, senior launch director in NASA’s Launch Services Program, during a briefing on November 15. “Given that, we were excepted by the FAA and we knew last week that we would be able to launch and would not be subject to the new FAA rules.”