According to Dan Piemont, the US$44.5 million Air Force contracts[3] include a one-year deal from the tech incubator AFWERX to demonstrate launch technology and an agreement with Space and Missile Systems Center's Space Enterprise Consortium to conduct three demonstrations of a RS1 vehicle variant and deployable ground infrastructure in 2022.
[9] The second attempt at launch failed on July 19, 2024 due to a static fire testing failure.
[16] In early 2020, the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) joined with ABL Space Systems to test and develop rocket-propulsion components.
[5] On 19 January 2022, an anomaly during testing at Mojave Air and Space Port resulted in the destruction of the second stage of the RS1 rocket.
[18] On 27 January, the source of the anomaly was publicly identified by ABL's CEO Harry O'Hanley as being one of the second stage's E2 Vacuum engine's turbopumps suffering a hard start, which led to a "substantial fire on the aft end of the vehicle, resulting in a complete failure about 20 seconds later".
[21] The first RS1 flight was planned for 2022 from the Pacific Spaceport Complex on Kodiak Island,[22] but the launch attempt was aborted.
[26] In the late 2010s, ABL announced they received a right of entry to use Launch Complex 576E at Vandenberg Space Force Base for the RS1.
[27] On 7 February 2021, Lockheed Martin and the United Kingdom announced a contract with ABL to launch the UK Pathfinder mission (6 CubeSats) in 2022, from the Shetland Space Centre on the island of Unst, Scotland.