NASA launches Roman Space Telescope, a former spy satellite turned toward the stars

A satellite once intended for the United States’ spy program has begun a new life as an observatory designed to survey the universe. NASA launched the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope on Sunday aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy from Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

The roughly $4 billion telescope will travel to Lagrange Point 2, an orbital position about 1.6 million kilometers from Earth, beyond the moon. Its planned mission will last five years, although NASA said it may have enough fuel to operate for another five.

Roman will investigate dark energy and dark matter, test gravity across vast distances and search for exoplanets. Scientists will spend the next 90 days commissioning the observatory and preparing it for research operations. Project manager Jackie Townsend said its first high-resolution images are expected before the winter holidays.

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It feels like I’m on the edge of a precipice, and we’re just about to set a foot off into the unknown.

The observatory began as part of a National Reconnaissance Office spy satellite program. The program ran over budget and ended, and the NRO donated the satellite to NASA in 2012. NASA then adapted it for cosmic exploration.

Roman is intended to complement the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes. Project scientist Julie McEnery said it has broadly the same sensitivity and sharpness as Hubble but can survey the cosmos much faster. She said Roman could survey the entire Milky Way in a month, a task that would take Hubble a century.

“NASA has no doubt that Roman will become a household name alongside those great instruments of discovery,” Administrator Jared Isaacman said. McEnery described the launch as the end of the engineering phase and the beginning of scientific work.

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I have no doubt that Roman will become a household name alongside those great instruments of discovery.