“Excited For The Future” NASA Wallops Island Discusses future with 2030 ISS end date announcement

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. – Wallops Island continues to be a major part of the NASA Antares mission to resupply the International Space Station, and as the end date for that mission of 2030 gets closer, NASA, Wallops, and Northrop Grumman see a bright future for the NASA Base.

“This 2030 date was actually later than we had initially anticipated and so we are looking forward to offering support through 2030 for the ISS,” said NASA Wallops Antares Project Manager Jeff Reddish, adding that the retiring of the ISS is “not an issue it’s a plus; we always look for new missions and we have many on the books so I see no reduction in the workforce in the future I see an increase in staffing to cover our portfolio of missions.”

Director of Space Launch Programs at Northrop Grumman Kurt Eberly tells us, his company keeps a team of 60 members on-site at Wallops to help organize and execute launches like the one scheduled for Saturday. He tells us as missions shift and the base would look to expand to other private-public partnerships, more staff would need to be brought on board to help with transitions.

They tell us they’re committed to helping the ISS mission as long as it is in-service and in need of resupply.

NASA’s Meteorologists hold a 75 percent likelihood for Saturday afternoon’s launch to move forward.