The company’s Electron rocket lifts off from the LC-2 at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on January 24, 2023.
Brady Kenniston / Rocket Lab
rocket labIts US debut kicked off Tuesday night, marking a successful mission and long-awaited expansion of the company’s capabilities.
The company’s Electron rocket was launched from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on the Virginia coast, carrying a trio of satellites into orbit for radio frequency analyst Hawkeye 360.
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“Electron has been the leading small-orbit rocket globally and today’s perfect mission from a new pad is testament to our team’s unwavering commitment to mission success,” said Peter Beck. , Rocket Lab’s CEO said in a statement Tuesday night.
The mission is Rocket Lab’s 33rd mission to date, but the first from American soil. The company has regularly launch from two separate launchers in New Zealand — with nine successful missions last year.
Tuesday’s launch also comes after years of delays.
The company chose Wallops at the end of 2018 to build a new launch pad, named LC-2, and aims to make its first launch in Q3 2019. The company has completed work on the infrastructure. ground level less than a year later and conducting initial testing with an Electron on the pad in mid-2020, but a new NASA safety software system thwarted the first launch attempt, according to Rocket Lab. .
Beck has previously said that NASA’s software development is “supposed to be complete by the end of 2021.” But certification by NASA’s Automated Flight Termination Unit (NAFTU), which is used to self-manage The act of overseeing a rocket launch and destroying vehicles if it was, of course, wasn’t completed until last year.
The software is designed to serve a role traditionally performed by one person, known as a “scope safety officer”, who oversees the launch’s data.
While several rocket companies have developed proprietary versions of automated flight safety software, NASA heralds its NAFTU system as “revolutionary” because it can be used by “any launch service provider at all U.S. launch ranges.” NASA also says NAFTU will help save time and money involved in safely conducting rocket launches into orbit — cost savings that will benefit the agency as well as companies.
Wallops director David Pierce said in a statement following the launch of Rocket Lab, that NASA’s completion of the system would fill “a critical gap in modernizing our nation’s launch range.”
“We are proud to have made this and future US Electron Rocket Lab Electron launches with our game-changing flight safety technology,” he said.
Rocket Lab previously said it scheduled to conduct 14 Electron launches by 2023, with anywhere between four and six flights from LC-2 at Wallops. The company is expected to release fourth-quarter results after the market close on February 28.
Shares of Rocket Lab were down about 2% in early trading Wednesday from a previous close of $4.97 a share. Like other pure play space stocks, the company’s stock has regained momentum this month after a brutal 2022, with the stock up about 28% year-to-date.
