ULA's Vulcan rocket is set to return to flight on Friday the 13th

United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket is set to return to flight on November 13th, carrying 40 satellites for Amazon's Leo broadband constellation. The launch will be the first to utilize a full complement of six solid rocket boosters and will be closely scrutinized by the US Space Force. The mission is critical for ULA, which suffered nozzle failures on two of its first four missions, but completed them successfully. The Space Force has entrusted ULA's Vulcan rocket for roughly half of its major launches through the early 2030s. Engineers at ULA have identified potential contributors to the booster anomaly and made design and process improvements to the nozzle. The upcoming launch will use the improved nozzle design and will provide valuable flight data to validate the improvements. Northrop Grumman, the booster manufacturer, has not publicly identified the root cause of the anomaly.