[11][12] In March 2010, an initial contract for construction of the spacecraft was awarded to Lockheed Martin Space Systems, which previously built the Ikonos imaging satellite.

[22] In July 2014, DigitalGlobe announced that GeoEye-2 had been renamed to WorldView-4 to better match the company's branding, and that, due to a projected increase in product demand, the spacecraft's launch had been scheduled for mid-2016.

During countdown on 16 September 2016, the launch was scrubbed due to a liquid hydrogen leak in the ground support equipment resulting in an ice ball forming on an umbilical cable.

[30] The Canyon Fire, a wildfire that burned over 5,157 ha (12,742 acres) on the southern section of Vandenberg,[31] resulted in a further launch delay so that the base could "concentrate [their] resources on the situation at hand".

[citation needed] Four additional fires of varying sizes broke out between 22 and 27 September 2016; while all were contained by the end of the 27th, base commander John Moss stated that until all facilities and instrumentation could be surveyed, no preliminary launch date could be determined.

[33][34] Repairs were made to the base's infrastructure affected by the wildfire, including power and communications, and the launch date was reset to 6 November 2016.

[35] The date was later pushed back to 11 November 2016 as ULA worked to fix "minor Atlas V booster issues" found during preparations.