Welcome to Edition 6.12 of the Rocket Report! Two of the world's most successful small satellite launchers suffered failures this week. We've seen many small launch companies experience failures on early test flights, but US-based Rocket Lab and China's Galactic Energy have accumulated more flight heritage than most of their competitors. Some might see these failures and use the "space is hard" cliché, but I'll just point to this week as a reminder that rocket launches still aren't routine.
As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets, as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
Rocket Lab suffers launch failure. Rocket Lab's string of 20 consecutive successful launches ended Tuesday when the company's Electron rocket failed to deliver a small commercial radar imaging satellite into orbit, Ars reports. The problem occurred on the upper stage of the Electron rocket about two and a half minutes after liftoff from the Mahia Peninsula in New Zealand. This was the fourth time a Rocket Lab mission has failed in 41 flights. A small commercial radar surveillance satellite from Capella Space was destroyed when the rocket crashed.
Not great, not terrible ... The Electron rocket has a 90 percent success rate over its 41 missions to date, which is still better than Rocket Lab's competitors in the market for dedicated launches of small satellites. Aside from Rocket Lab, Astra and Firefly Aerospace are the only other active companies in the new wave of commercial small satellite launch startups that have achieved orbit. Virgin Orbit launched a handful of successful missions, but that company went out of business earlier this year. (submitted by Ken the Bin)
Firefly launches responsive space mission. Firefly Aerospace's Alpha rocket successfully delivered a US military satellite into low-Earth orbit on September 14, Ars reports. The two-stage Alpha launch vehicle lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California with a small satellite built by Millennium Space Systems. This was the third flight of Firefly's Alpha rocket, which is designed to lift about a ton of payload into orbit. But it was the first time Alpha has successfully placed a satellite into the planned orbit, following a launch failure in 2021 shortly after liftoff, and an off-target orbital deployment last year.
"Conquer the night" ...As part of its efforts to be more nimble in space, the US military has been pushing satellite and launch companies to become more "responsive" in their ability to put spacecraft into space. This launch—known as Victus Nox, Latin for "conquer the night"—was the next step in the military's effort to demonstrate it can quickly replace a satellite that might be destroyed by an enemy attack in a future conflict. Firefly and Millennium met the military's goal of being "launch ready" within 24 hours, and the total time from receiving the go command to liftoff was 27 hours, far eclipsing the previous record set by the first tactically responsive launch two years ago. (submitted by Ken the Bin)