THE NEW SPACE RACE: NRO reaches milestone with over 200 satellites deployed in two years.

The NROL-145 mission lifted off Sunday on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 8:29 a.m. Eastern. This marked SpaceX’s 10th launch of satellites for the NRO’s proliferated architecture, which includes Starshield imaging satellites built by SpaceX and Northrop Grumman.

A proliferated architecture refers to the strategy of using numerous smaller satellites rather than fewer large ones, creating networks that are more resilient against potential threats and capable of providing more comprehensive coverage.

Impressive — both the cadence and NRO having enough imagination to take advantage of it.