A SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle launched NASA’s IMAP mission to interplanetary transfer orbit, along with NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Space Weather Follow On-Lagrange 1 (SWFO-L1), from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 24 September 2025, at 11:30 UTC (07:30 EDT). Following stage separation, Falcon 9’s first stage (B1096) landed on the “Just Read the Instructions” droneship, stationed in the Atlantic Ocean, having previously supported the KF-01 launch. According to NASA, Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) will map the boundaries of our heliosphere, study the Sun’s activity and how the heliosphere boundary interacts with the local galactic neighbourhood beyond. NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory is a small satellite that will observe Earth’s outermost atmospheric layer, the exosphere. It will image the faint glow of ultraviolet light from this region, called the geocorona, to better understand how space weather impacts our planet. The SWFO-L1 spacecraft will monitor space weather and detect solar storms in advance, serving as an early warning beacon for potentially disruptive space weather, helping safeguard Earth’s critical infrastructure and technological-dependent industries. The SWFO-L1 spacecraft is the first NOAA observatory designed specifically for and fully dedicated to continuous, operational space weather observations.