It was launched atop a Minotaur rocket, from Wallops Island, at 06:48 GMT on 24 April 2007.

Though primarily designed to gather data on exhaust plumes from rockets, the satellite was also intended to contain a kill vehicle similar to kinds intended for the Strategic Defense Initiative.

In 2004, the United States House of Representatives instructed the Missile Defense Agency, MDA, to remove the kill vehicle from the planned 2006 NFIRE launch, approving $68 million in FY2005 subject to that condition.

[2] The Senate Appropriations Committee reviewing the NFIRE program, however, urged the MDA to return the missile defense interceptor (kill vehicle) to the originally scheduled test, despite the controversial perception of this leading to the deployment of weapons in space.

The MDA removed the kill vehicle portion of the planned test, saying it posed a risk of technical failure, and replaced it with a laser communications payload from Tesat-Spacecom.