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by JshWright 3070 days ago
It's been up and down several times over the past few weeks. It only takes a couple hours to move it in or out.

The fact that Falcon 9/Heavy only support horizontal integration is a bot of an issue for some payloads (particularly those with people, or big optics). SpaceX will be adding vertical integration (the ability to mount the payload after the rocket is vertical) to its pad at LC-39A.

1 comments

Are they? I was under the impression that crew can be loaded via the Crew Access Arm with the rocket vertical, but Dragon would still be integrated horizontally.
Dragon likely will be integrated horizontally but some national security payloads need vertical integration.
Why do some national security payloads need vertical integration?
They won't say, because they're secret. But it's probably optics or just some legacy designs that they don't want to qualify for horizontal.