A crane lifts NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory on Thursday, July 24, 2025, at the Astrotech Space Operations Facility near the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Carruthers Geocorona Observatory is a small satellite set to operate at Lagrange Point 1 (L1), an orbit point between the Earth and Sun about one million miles away. Carruthers will use its ultraviolet cameras to monitor how space weather from the Sun impacts the exosphere, the outermost part of Earth’s atmosphere. The observatory will launch as a rideshare with NASA’s IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe) no earlier than September 2025.