SHERPA (space tug)

SHERPA is a commercial satellite dispenser developed by Andrews Space, a subsidiary of Spaceflight Industries,^[1] and was unveiled in 2012. The maiden flight was on 3 December 2018 on a Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket, and it consisted of two separate unpropelled variants of the dispenser.

Riding atop the launcher's final stage, SHERPA's release follows deployment of the primary mission payload for the dispensing of minisatellites, microsatellites, or nanosatellites such as CubeSats. SHERPA builds upon the capabilities of the Spaceflight Secondary Payload System (SSPS) by incorporating propulsion and power generation subsystems, which creates a propulsive tug dedicated to maneuvering to an optimal orbit to place secondary and hosted payloads.