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The rocket is on the pad and ready to goRocket Lab
The US-based company Rocket Lab is gearing up for its third-ever launch tomorrow, its first fully commercial flight and a key milestone as it aims to prove the viability of smaller rockets.
Their Electron rocket, given the nickname “It’s Business Time”, is set to lift off from Rocket Lab’s Launch Complex 1 on the east coast of New Zealand’s North Island this weekend. The rocket has a nine-day launch window, with the first launch opportunity coming on Saturday 10 November at 10pm Eastern time.
On board will be seven payloads, including a demonstration drag sail to practice de-orbiting space junk and a student-led experiment. If all goes to plan, the rocket will place these payloads into an orbit 500 kilometers (310 miles) above Earth.
“It’s looking good,” the company’s CEO Peter Beck told Forbes, noting that this first commercial flight was “an important milestone for the industry.”
Their rocket, Electron, is not particularly big by regular standards. At 17 meters (56 feet) tall, it’s about a quarter the size of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. But what Rocket Lab is banking on is an emergent field of small-sat launchers – lower-cost rockets that can be ready for launch more quickly than their bigger counterparts.
Each Electron costs just $5.7 million, compared to up to $50 million for a Falcon 9 rocket. And while a customer might have to wait up to two years to get a ride on a rocket like the Falcon 9, Rocket Lab are promising to shorten the wait to just six months.
This launch was originally supposed to take place in April this year, but several issues with the rocket meant that the launch was pushed back. Beck noted, however, that preparing for the future was the company’s key goal at the moment.
“What we’re looking to do here is build towards the next 100 rockets, not the next one rocket,” he said. “We’ve always been very bold and not too shy to say that we hope to be launching to space the most often of anybody in the world.”
The company has a near-term goal of launching a rocket every month, increasing that to one a fortnight by the end of 2019 and one a week by 2020, including from a second launch site in Virginia and possibly one in the UK. And their next launch, planned for December, is a big one – a mission to take some small satellites for NASA into orbit. “It’s a great honor for anybody who lifts NASA flights,” said Beck.
Strictly speaking this is not Rocket Lab’s first commercial flight. Their last in January 2018, called "Still Testing", did include some commercial payloads on board, whereas their first flight in May 2017 (“It’s a Test”) was solely a test flight. But this flight signals the company moving out of research and development into fully fledged operations.
(Note, those quirky names are dreamed up by the company’s staff. “It’s a very serious business,” said Beck. “You’ve got to have some fun along the way.”)
And if they’re successful with this and future launches, that will be music to the ears of this corner of the launch industry. Small sat-launchers are on the rise, with various other companies announcing their own ambitions to try to match Rocket Lab and launch their own smaller rockets.
So far, Rocket Lab is at the forefront of this new field. And with hundreds of companies now looking to gain access to space, not everyone will be looking to the bigger companies to reach orbit. For them, rockets like Electron will be crucial.
“I think this is an important milestone for the industry,” said Beck. “There’s such a backlog of customers. For me it’s really the beginning point, and I’m hoping we can see much more innovation in the space industry and new exciting projects and services that have a big impact on all of us on Earth.”
Before all that, there’s the small matter of getting It’s Business Time to orbit. And if all goes to plan, come the end of this weekend Rocket Lab – and many others – will have cause for celebration.
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The rocket is on the pad and ready to goRocket Lab
The US-based company Rocket Lab is gearing up for its third-ever launch tomorrow, its first fully commercial flight and a key milestone as it aims to prove the viability of smaller rockets.
Their Electron rocket, given the nickname “It’s Business Time”, is set to lift off from Rocket Lab’s Launch Complex 1 on the east coast of New Zealand’s North Island this weekend. The rocket has a nine-day launch window, with the first launch opportunity coming on Saturday 10 November at 10pm Eastern time.
On board will be seven payloads, including a demonstration drag sail to practice de-orbiting space junk and a student-led experiment. If all goes to plan, the rocket will place these payloads into an orbit 500 kilometers (310 miles) above Earth.
“It’s looking good,” the company’s CEO Peter Beck told Forbes, noting that this first commercial flight was “an important milestone for the industry.”
Their rocket, Electron, is not particularly big by regular standards. At 17 meters (56 feet) tall, it’s about a quarter the size of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. But what Rocket Lab is banking on is an emergent field of small-sat launchers – lower-cost rockets that can be ready for launch more quickly than their bigger counterparts.
Each Electron costs just $5.7 million, compared to up to $50 million for a Falcon 9 rocket. And while a customer might have to wait up to two years to get a ride on a rocket like the Falcon 9, Rocket Lab are promising to shorten the wait to just six months.
This launch was originally supposed to take place in April this year, but several issues with the rocket meant that the launch was pushed back. Beck noted, however, that preparing for the future was the company’s key goal at the moment.
“What we’re looking to do here is build towards the next 100 rockets, not the next one rocket,” he said. “We’ve always been very bold and not too shy to say that we hope to be launching to space the most often of anybody in the world.”
The company has a near-term goal of launching a rocket every month, increasing that to one a fortnight by the end of 2019 and one a week by 2020, including from a second launch site in Virginia and possibly one in the UK. And their next launch, planned for December, is a big one – a mission to take some small satellites for NASA into orbit. “It’s a great honor for anybody who lifts NASA flights,” said Beck.
Strictly speaking this is not Rocket Lab’s first commercial flight. Their last in January 2018, called “Still Testing”, did include some commercial payloads on board, whereas their first flight in May 2017 (“It’s a Test”) was solely a test flight. But this flight signals the company moving out of research and development into fully fledged operations.
(Note, those quirky names are dreamed up by the company’s staff. “It’s a very serious business,” said Beck. “You’ve got to have some fun along the way.”)
And if they’re successful with this and future launches, that will be music to the ears of this corner of the launch industry. Small sat-launchers are on the rise, with various other companies announcing their own ambitions to try to match Rocket Lab and launch their own smaller rockets.
So far, Rocket Lab is at the forefront of this new field. And with hundreds of companies now looking to gain access to space, not everyone will be looking to the bigger companies to reach orbit. For them, rockets like Electron will be crucial.
“I think this is an important milestone for the industry,” said Beck. “There’s such a backlog of customers. For me it’s really the beginning point, and I’m hoping we can see much more innovation in the space industry and new exciting projects and services that have a big impact on all of us on Earth.”
Before all that, there’s the small matter of getting It’s Business Time to orbit. And if all goes to plan, come the end of this weekend Rocket Lab – and many others – will have cause for celebration.
