Credit: Rocket Labĭuring the final hours of the countdown in Virginia, Rocket Lab’s launch team will load kerosene and liquid oxygen propellants into the Electron rocket. Rocket Lab’s Electron launcher on its launch pad in Virginia. Rocket Lab has two launch pads at its privately-owned spaceport on the North Island of New Zealand, where the first 32 Electron rockets took off before the Virginia launch site entered service. That flight will deploy two optical Earth-imaging satellites for BlackSky. This weekend’s flight will be the company’s second launch of the year.Īt the same time ground teams are readying the Electron rocket for launch from Virginia, Rocket Lab engineers are preparing a different Electron rocket for a mission later this month from the company’s spaceport in New Zealand. Rocket Lab started the year aiming to launch as many as 15 missions with its Electron rocket in 2023. The two-stage, carbon fiber Electron launcher will head southeast from the Virginia spaceport, located at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, and take advantage of a velocity boost from Earth’s rotation, helping accelerate the two Capella satellites into orbit. The target orbit for the Capella Space mission is at an altitude of 373 miles (600 kilometers) and an inclination of 44 degrees to the equator. Larger rockets, such as SpaceX’s Falcon 9, can carry numerous small satellites on rideshare missions, but often does not release the payloads in each customer’s preferred orbit. The rocket can haul up to 440 pounds (200 kilograms) of payload into a 310-mile-high (500-kilometer) polar orbit, according to Rocket Lab, which has carved a niche in the global launch market for delivering small payloads on dedicated rides to low Earth orbit. The tandem satellite launch will come close to maxing out the Electron rocket’s lift capability. There are two radar Earth observation satellites - each roughly 220 pounds (100 kilograms) - aboard the Electron rocket awaiting liftoff. 24 with a trio of HawkEye 360 radio frequency monitoring satellites.Ĭapella Space, the San Francisco-based radar remote sensing company, is the customer for the second Rocket Lab flight from Virginia. Rocket Lab launched its first mission from the new pad Jan. The mission will be Rocket Lab’s 34th launch, and the company’s second from Launch Complex 2, or Pad 0C, on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.
When the weather is acceptable, a 59-foot-tall (18-meter) Electron rocket will fire off the launch pad with nine kerosene-fueled engines generating more than 50,000 pounds of thrust. Rocket Lab did not immediately set a new target launch date.
EST (2300 GMT) for liftoff Saturday from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at Wallops Island, Virginia, but officials scrubbed the launch attempt due to upper level winds that were out limits.
The company had a two-hour launch window opening at 6 p.m. Rocket Lab’s second mission from a new launch pad in Virginia is set to take off with two commercial radar remote sensing satellites for Capella Space. This artist’s concept shows a Capella Whitney-class satellite in orbit with its solar arrays and radar reflector unfurled. EDITOR’S NOTE: Rocket Lab scrubbed a launch attempt Saturday, March 11, due to out of limits upper level winds.
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