Watch Rocket Lab launch Japanese Earth-observing radar satellite from New Zealand tonight

Rocket Lab will launch a Japanese Earth-observing radar satellite to orbit tonight (June 30), and you can watch the action live.

An Electron rocket carrying the QPS-SAR-13 satellite is scheduled to lift off from Rocket Lab's New Zealand site tonight at 9 p.m. EDT (0100 GMT and 1 p.m. local New Zealand time on July 1).

You can watch the launch live via Rocket Lab, with coverage beginning about 30 minutes before liftoff. Space.com will carry the stream as well, if the company makes it available.

Japan-based iQPS is building a constellation of 36 satellites in low Earth orbit that study Earth using high-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR). SAR spacecraft can peer through clouds and gather data at night as well as during the day.

Tonight's launch, which Rocket Lab calls "The Grain Goddess Provides," will be the eighth, out of a total of 15, that it will perform to assemble iQPS' constellation.

If all goes according to plan tonight, Electron will deploy the iQPS satellite — which is nicknamed Mikura-I, after a Japanese goddess associated with abundance and prosperity — about 50 minutes after liftoff, into a circular orbit 357 miles (575 kilometers) above Earth.

"The Grain Goddess Provides" will be Rocket Lab's 92nd mission to date and its 13th of 2026 already. The vast majority of these launches have involved the 59-foot-tall (18-meter-tall) Electron, which gives small satellites dedicated rides to orbit. A small number have been performed by HASTE , a suborbital version of Electron that helps customers test hypersonic technologies.

Tonight's launch will come just a day after Rocket Lab made a big business move: On Monday (June 29), Rocket Lab announced that it's acquiring the communications company Iridium for $8 billion.

"By combining our launch capability and satellite manufacturing with @IridiumComm’s global satellite communications network and rare spectrum, Rocket Lab becomes a fully integrated, self-launching, tier-1 space power, delivering critical communications capability to millions of users worldwide," Rocket Lab said via X on Monday.