NASA Taps Startup to Save Falling Swift Space Telescope

NASA’s decades-old Swift Observatory, a sentinel in space monitoring the universe’s most powerful gamma-ray explosions, is slowly falling out of orbit. Now, the U.S. space agency has turned to an Arizona startup to pull off a daring rescue before the telescope risks uncontrolled reentry by the end of 2026.

The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, launched in 2004, has been orbiting Earth for more than two decades, but recent spikes in solar activity have increased atmospheric drag, accelerating the telescope’s descent. NASA has given Katalyst Space Technologies, based in Flagstaff, a $30 million contract to deliver a lifeline to Swift through a specially designed spacecraft named LINK.

LINK’s mission is ambitious: it will autonomously rendezvous with the decaying observatory and nudge it into a more stable orbit, buying more years for Swift’s invaluable observations of gamma-ray bursts. The startup faces a tight timeline, with a launch deadline set for June 2026—less than eight months from now.

In a strikingly unconventional approach, Katalyst plans to launch LINK aboard Northrop Grumman’s Pegasus rocket, an air-launched vehicle that drops from a plane at 40,000 feet before igniting mid-air to reach orbit. This method was chosen because Swift’s orbit, at a 20.6-degree inclination, would make conventional ground launches inefficient and prohibitively costly.

Over the years, Swift has gradually lost altitude, as all satellites do, but Katalyst warns that current conditions give the telescope a 50% chance of uncontrolled reentry by mid-2026 and a 90% chance by year’s end. While a fall through the atmosphere would safely burn the telescope up, the potential loss of its long-running scientific contributions has prompted this urgent mission.

The Pegasus rocket, which has flown infrequently in recent years due to competition from cheaper ground-launched rockets, is being revived for this mission. “It’s the only system that can meet the orbit, timeline, and budget simultaneously,” says Kieran Wilson, Katalyst’s VP of technology.

If successful, the mission could set a precedent for rescuing other aging satellites and observatories, extending the life of critical space assets while avoiding costly replacements. Swift’s journey may soon prove that, even in orbit, innovation and ingenuity can prevent a fall from the sky.