It sounded like a prowler was kicking in her back door.
That’s how Linda Grasse described an early January sonic boom that sent the Santa Barbara real estate broker and her grandkids scrambling.
“I was ready to kill somebody,” Grasse said.
Above Santa Barbara County, rockets launched into the air from Vandenberg Space Force Base near Lompoc are dazzling crowds and driving economic opportunity.
But not everyone is uplifted.
The rockets are also sparking widespread opposition and raising concerns about impacts to the coastal environment, homes and buildings. People startled from sleep often ask, “Was that an earthquake?”
SpaceX, the private space transportation company led by billionaire founder and CEO Elon Musk, launched its Falcon 9 rocket 64 times last year at Vandenberg, a base record. With as many as 82 launches planned for this year and up to 100 a year in 2027 and 2028, it’s a record ready to be broken again and again.
Falcon Heavy, a rocket three times as powerful as Falcon 9, is expected to launch from the base for the first time in 2027 and again up to five times annually.
This all comes as base officials eye even more ambitious activity. In a request for information (RFI) published on Dec. 29, they seek interest from spaceflight companies in running a new launch complex on currently undeveloped Vandenberg land for “heavy or super-heavy” rockets.
That complex, in an area known as Sudden Flats, could accommodate the towering SpaceX Starship. It’s the most powerful launch vehicle ever built, eclipsing the power of the Space Shuttle and extraordinary thrust of the massive Saturn V booster used on Apollo moon missions.
Ongoing controversy
The Air Force authorized its plan for as many as 100 SpaceX launches a year in October over objections from environmentalists, the California Coastal Commission and residents like Grasse, who are concerned about the effects of sonic booms, pollution, and dangers to wildlife.
The frequency and intensity of Falcon 9 launches has drawn major objection from some local residents, who complain the sonic pressure is not only disrupting their lives but also physically damaging their homes and businesses.
Falcon Heavy sonic booms are expected to be similar if not bigger, with the simultaneous landing of two boosters driving “minor increases to cumulative noise,” according to the Air Force.
SpaceX first launched a rocket from Vandenberg in 2013, in a Falcon 9 demonstration that took a small Canadian research satellite into orbit. The company carried mostly government and private payloads from the base on 16 Falcon 9 trips through 2020 and 90 more from the start of 2021 through 2024.
As launch noise grew more frequent, local residents raised more concerns. In recent months, some have complained of broken windows, fractured walls, disrupted sleep, emotional distress, and anxious cats and dogs.
The Air Force acknowledges launches and landings have the potential to disturb structures.
“Damage associated with noise and vibrations may occur to lightweight or brittle structural elements in poor condition, such as windows and plaster that are pre-cracked, prestressed, older and weakened, or poorly mounted,” the Air Force said in a statement. “However, damage to windows and plaster in good condition and structural damage to buildings is not expected,” according to a Final Environmental Impact Statement the Air Force approved when it authorized changes to the Falcon launch program.
In addition, the Air Force said noise-induced stress can elevate blood pressure and heart rates, disrupt sleep, “lead to long-term health consequences such as fatigue and cognitive impairments” and “interfere with concentration, productivity and relaxation, exacerbating psychological distress.”
That said, “the frequency of these events would not be expected to cause chronic health problems,” according to the Air Force. “The DAF would attempt to minimize the number of launches between 10 p.m and 6 a.m. to the maximum extent practicable.”
This comes as the Trump Administration appears to be OK with more frequent sonic booms nationwide. In June, the president issued an executive order instructing the Federal Aviation Administration to begin easing restrictions on overland supersonic flight.
Outside the South Side Coffee Co. in Lompoc, Vernard Good and friends sat at a sidewalk cafe table on a recent weekday morning and discussed economic benefits of the Vandenberg launch program, as well as detriments like broken stucco.
Good, a former civilian aerospace employee who worked at the base in a materials support role, said he feels for people with pets that suffer. He wondered whether someone might someday experience a heart attack triggered by a sonic boom.
“I’m waiting for the day,” he said.
Economic impacts
A company like SpaceX, which drives an estimated $18 billion to $24 billion in annual revenue, can have a big effect on a local economy. Indeed, some local businesses are reaping the benefits, with one hotel saying up to 20 percent of its business is now tied to Vandenberg activities.
The new launch cadence is expected to provide 700 SpaceX jobs, according to the Air Force.
Locally, SpaceX estimates its activities overall will support 3,000 jobs across the region and deliver more than $1.2 billion in gross economic output from 2024 to 2026, according to a presentation slide shared by Vandenberg. It states SpaceX in 2024 engaged more than 130 local suppliers, injecting $34 million of spending into the local supply chain.
“The launch business is good business,” said Melanie Lindley, executive director of the Lompoc Valley Chamber of Commerce and Visitors Bureau, adding SpaceX brings not only jobs, but also tourism. “People come in from all over the state… The excitement around these things is great.”
Over at the Village Inn located at the gateway to Vandenberg Village on Apollo Way, her husband Jacob Lindley, the general manager, described the hotel’s recent down-to-the-studs renovation. The resulting retro-inspired mid-century modern aesthetic evokes the hey-day of the Cold War space race, and it’s no coincidence.
The inn, which opened in June, actively courts visitors with business at SpaceX and the base, as well as those in town to catch a launch. Guests like these are responsible for as much as a fifth of the hotel’s revenue, Jacob Lindley said.
A patio lounge adjacent to the main entrance is a welcoming spot for launch parties, Lindley said, adding the rainbow arc of a climbing Falcon 9 — and more rockets to come — beautifully frame the property’s front-facing view.
“It’ll benefit us, but it’ll also benefit the community,” he said. “Tax dollars don’t lie.”
Launches and landings
SpaceX launch spectacles aren’t just about the launches. When the company’s rocket boosters return to earth, they can land vertically on land or atop a ship at sea.
To date, Falcon 9 has operated from a launch complex known as Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4), which SpaceX leases from the Department of the Air Force for an undisclosed sum.
The newly-approved SpaceX launch plan will double landings at Vandenberg to as many as 24 — up to 12 at SLC-4 and another 12 at the nearby SLC-6, a complex dormant since 2024 and previously leased to United Launch Alliance to launch Delta IV Heavy.
Under the plan, SpaceX will also conduct up to 76 at-sea landings of boosters atop its drone ship offshore of Baja California, Mexico. These boosters will be transported to the Port of Long Beach, transferred to a different barge, brought to the Vandenberg dock, offloaded onto a transport vehicle, and conveyed back to the launch complexes for reuse.
Up to 10 launches a year will use expendable boosters discarded into the Pacific Ocean. In addition, fairing covers that protect payloads and separate during launch will splashdown via parachute into the Pacific Ocean and later be recovered if possible, according to the Air Force.
Construction ahead
The request for interest in a heavy or super-heavy launch facility could pave the way for even bigger SpaceX craft.
Starship, the most powerful launch vehicle ever, can carry cargo and people to orbit, the moon, Mars, and “point-to-point transport on Earth, enabling travel to anywhere in the world in one hour or less,” according to SpaceX.
To date, Starship has launched 11 times to varying success from Texas, all test flights. At 403 feet, the vehicle is nearly twice as tall as Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy—or nearly two Granada Theatre buildings high—with a diameter of more than 29 feet. SpaceX claims it will eventually be able to haul a payload of as much as 150 tons.
The Starship Super Heavy reusable launch booster has 33 engines that together generate 17 million pounds of thrust, equal to approximately 66 Boeing 747 airplanes.
While the military gathers responses to its request for a new super-heavy launch facility, new buildings are already coming to Vandenberg, and some existing structures will be demolished to make way.
At SLC-6, SpaceX will construct a 62,000-square-foot hangar, a rail system from the hangar to the launch pad to transport rockets, and 143,000 square feet of storage including tanks for liquid oxygen, rocket propellant, water, nitrogen, helium, “and other launch commodities,” according to the Air Force.
In addition, SpaceX will build two 400-foot-diameter landing zones south of SLC-6, install a 200-foot water tower east of the launch pad and relocate the SLC-6 perimeter fence.
SpaceX will continue to use a deluge of 70,000 gallons of water per launch to suppress noise and vibrations, drawing supplies primarily from the California State Water Project.
A construction start date has not been finalized, said Jennifer Green-Lanchoney, a spokesperson for Space Launch Delta 30, adding SpaceX will bear the cost.
SpaceX representatives did not respond to multiple News-Press interview requests for this story.
Nature & wildlife
Land animals identified as potentially affected include federally endangered tidewater gobies, arroyo toads, and California condors as well as federally threatened California red-legged frogs, marbled murralets, California Least Terns, and Western Snowy Plovers.
Marine life possibly harmed includes federally endangered leatherback sea turtles, blue whales, humpback whales and orcas as well as federally threatened green sea turtles, Guadalupe fur seals, and Southern sea otters.
In approving the new launch plan, the Air Force determined a wide range of wildlife including protected species will not be significantly affected. Base officials said they will monitor impacts to land and marine animals—as well as air quality and other environmental impacts—and are developing a mitigation plan outlined in their environmental assessment.
“Vandenberg has a dedicated team of over 40 civilians and contractors actively working to protect the base’s biodiversity,” Green-Lanchoney said. “While efforts are ongoing, the mitigation plan outlined in the Environmental Impact Statement is still under development and execution. At this time, the plan is not available for public release.”
Coastal Commission questions
At the Coastal Commission, officials have questioned the veracity of Air Force sonic boom modeling and whether the launch plan now approved underestimates effects. Commission staff questioned sonic boom modeling for Falcon Heavy in particular, and asserted that methods used by the military in recent years “have varied wildly.”
Although it was never destined to be binding—the Coastal Commission doesn’t have the power to override the federal government—the agency at an August hearing in Calabasas rejected the now-approved Air Force plan for 100 launches.
The Air Force didn’t attend. And SpaceX, also absent, had already sued the commission a year prior, alleging the commission’s previous denial of an increase from 36 to 50 annual launches was politically motivated.
Citing that ongoing litigation, Coastal Commission Spokesman Joshua Smith told the News-Press that agency officials would not be available to comment for this article.
Coastal Commission officials in August described the Air Force analysis of wildlife impacts as incomplete, stating they had “significant unresolved questions” due to an “absence of robust data.”
“Sonic booms can be desperately unpleasant,” Commissioner Dayna Bochco said publicly at the time. “And obviously the environment is very special.”
Commissioner Caryl Hart said she was concerned about the rich biodiversity of Central and South Coast shores, the Santa Barbara Channel, the Channel Islands and the coastline and land located at the base itself. “I don’t think we can overstate the importance of Vandenberg and its biotic resources.”
To ensure public safety, the launches coming to Vandenberg will necessitate 12 annual beach and campground closures at Jalama Beach County Park. and five closures of Ocean Beach and Surf Beach.
Public vs. private benefits
In addition to concerns about noise, damage and environmental effects, the growth of SpaceX at Vandenberg raises another issue—the balance of public benefits and private profits when federal facilities become home to a commercial operation.
The Air Force says the launches represent federal government activity. But they also clearly advance Starlink, the commercial SpaceX network of thousands of satellites that provide high-speed broadband internet service.
As a private company, SpaceX does not publish earnings.
The company is reportedly planning a $1.5 trillion initial public stock offering (IPO) this year, according to The Motley Fool, which recently estimated “SpaceX generated at least $15 billion in revenue in 2025. It’s expected to grow that number to $22 billion or even $24 billion this year.”
Payload Space in April estimated SpaceX would generate $18.2 billion in revenue in 2025. Breaking that down, the firm predicted nearly $13 billion would come from Starlink and more than $5 billion from other launches.
The Air Force maintains the increase in SpaceX activity at Vandenberg including Starlink launches comes with legitimate purpose and need, benefitting the U.S. Department of Defense and NASA along with other federal and commercial SpaceX customers.
More launches enhance the resiliency and capacity of the nation’s space launch infrastructure, according to the Air Force, which says they bolster national security objectives that include satellites and other space assets that “enable intelligence, reconnaissance, and global security operations.”
“The Space Force considers all launch activities as federal activities because the launches take place from federal property and are executed with federal oversight and approval,” Green-Lanchoney told the News-Press. “Launch service providers play a critical role in supporting U.S. national defense and strategic objectives.
“This is not a new phenomenon, and the government has partnered with industry to take advantage of American innovation for decades. A thriving commercial space industry, firmly partnered with the Space Force, is essential for strategic competition and shaping the global security environment.”
When it cast doubt on the expanded launch schedule, Coastal Commission staff asserted that the Department of the Air Force “has not submitted adequate information to support the claim that SpaceX launches from the base are, in fact, a federal agency activity.”
Approximately 30 of roughly 132 SpaceX launches from 2018 through July 2025 carried U.S. government payloads, according to a Coastal Commission estimate based on a review of SpaceX and online publications.
“The simple fact remains that it is a privately owned company engaged in activities primarily for its own commercial business,” staff wrote. “It is not a public federal agency or conducting its launches on behalf of the federal government.”
The staff report continued: “With its Starlink satellite constellation, SpaceX owns significantly more satellites than the combined total owned by every country and every other company in the world. Building and maintaining this system and leadership position is the primary purpose for launches and reason for their proposed increase.”
A prominent link on the Vandenberg website home page invites noise complaints from the public. The base received 218 such grievances in 2025, according to Green-Lanchoney. “We do not publicly release noise complaints. However, base leadership and the spaceport operations team review them to assess the regional impact of launch noise.”
