Welcome to version 3.24 of the Rocket Report! It’s December, and we’ve seen a number of large smallsets this month, including Virgin Orbit and Astra. But in the near future, our focus is on South Texas, where the starship prototype will jump early next week.
As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you do not want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the following using x (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 at the three launches coming to the lander.
AVUM unveiled its Ravan X launching system. So far, so much has been working in the background. But now, it’s ready to show off some hardware, and it starts with the first phase of the “Ravan X” launch system, Ars reports. This autonomous aircraft and launch vehicle measures 24 meters long and has wingspan of 18 meters. It has an overall takeoff mass of 25,000 kg – huge for an uncrewed aerial vehicle. It will launch a rocket capable of carrying 100 kilograms of sun-synchronous orbit.
Trying to make satellite delivery a thing … The company is targeting for its first launch next year. Although the Ravan X has finalized the first phase, Avum is developing a rocket with two liquid-fueled engines for its main phase, each with a 5,000-pound thrust and a single upper-phase engine. These engines have been tested even hotter than their full-term burning and they have passed the qualification and acceptance test, the company said. AVUM claims it has won more than $ 1 billion in launch deals over the next decade, including the Air Force’s ASLON-45 mission.
Virgin Orbit sets a date for the second launch attempt. On Monday, Virgin BitRbit announced that it would test the second orbital flight of its launcher rocket or rocket on Saturday, December 19th. The four-hour window will open at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC). During the company’s first demo flight last May, the rocket was successfully lowered from its carrier aircraft, and its engine ignited for a few seconds before running out of its LOX due to a blocked line.
At this point, the customer will be … There were no payloads in that mission, but this one will. Through its Venture Class Launch Services program, NASA Launch Demo 2 offers nine cubeset missions consisting of 10 total spacecraft to fly on 2 missions. The company said it has yet to rehearse the wet dress before starting its launch efforts. Good luck! (Submitted by Ken Bin)
Relativity will add 500 500 million to the off-farm space fund. The launch company, which aims to 3D print almost the entirety of its rockets, announced in late November that it had discontinued a wide range of DD funding. This raises the company’s valuation, according to CNBC reports. 2.3 billion. It also makes the company the second most valuable private space company behind just SpaceX.
Cash … glow … “This accelerates the speed and scaling of this relativity as we focus beyond the first projection on production and various infrastructure expansion projects,” Ellis said. We can confirm that this is a lot of private funding for the rocket company to raise, especially before its first launch attempt. This can only help the relative catch up with his aggressive 2021 launch schedule. (Submitted by Ken Bin)
Rocket Lab says recovered stage recovered “in good condition”. Ten days after launching its “Return to Sender” mission, Rocket Lab provided an update on its first attempt to recover an electron rocket in the first phase. “We couldn’t have sought better results from our earlier recovery efforts and the team is thrilled.” The rocket returned to such good condition, the company added, “We will re-envelop some components and fly again.”
Not ready for the chopper yet … Marked for the first time on a November 20 flight, Rocket Lab was preparing to pull an electron out of the Pacific Ocean. The rocket was taken into New Zealand coastal waters, from where small booster launches. Founder Peter Beck said the company wanted to assess the health of the first phase and make the necessary changes to the heat-shield and flight software before moving on to the final step of capturing the center of the electron rocket from the helicopter. This could happen next year after further tests.
The billionaire has invested in Shetland Spaceport. According to BBC reports, Anders and Ann Holch Powellsen are investing 1.5 1.5 million (2 2 million) in a proposed spaceport on Shetland Island, north of Scotland. The couple’s company, Wildland Limited, is also taking legal action to stop plans to build a space hub Sutherland in the Scottish Highlands.
Nimbyway, Rocket Edition … The Danish couple, who own a retail garment kingdom, also own thousands of acres in other settlements in Sutherland and the Highlands. Powellsense has expressed concern about the impact on the space hub Sutherland’s Kithness and the Sutherland Pitlands Special Protection Area. This seems to be a brave attempt to strengthen the finances for the Shetland site and to attract investment and support away from the Sutherland location. (Submitted by BH)
Vector’s Jim Cantrell is back. According to reports from the Arizona Daily Star, rocket company Vector’s co-founder, Phantom Space, is quietly launching plans to provide micro-satellite launch services, as well as small satellites and propulsion systems. Cantrell told the publication that he was convinced by Vector’s former colleague, Michael D’Angelo, to start another satellite tech company, after finding that many of the lessons learned from Vector could be used. The Phantom is preparing to build four launching vehicles and hopes to launch its first orbital flight in about two years.
Fool me once … Cantrell said the Phantom is taking a broader view of the evolving new space industry, driven by the rapid development of small satellites for research and communications. Instead of building a unified company, Ground also integrates existing technologies that make everything up from the ground up – including the proven, she f-the-shelf engine specifically for its launch vehicles – into the system to serve its customers. “We are a space transportation company,” Cantrell said. “Thinking about the future, we don’t know what a killer app is. One thing we do know is that, people have to send their objects into space and you have to move them around, and sometimes bring them back.” We will take a wait-and-see approach to this. (Submitted by Platycortic and Ken Bean)
NASA is on the SpaceX track for the next cargo launch. The space agency said it was targeting SpaceX’s International Space Station for the 21st Commercial Response Services mission on Saturday, December 5th. However, weather officials with the 45th Space Wing of the U.S. Air Force are predicting only a 40 percent chance of favorable weather conditions for the lift off of the Kennedy Space Center’s SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and cargo dragon spacecraft.
The rocket enlarges its second ISS mission … This will be the first mission under the company’s second commercial response services contract with NASA and the first flight of an upgraded cargo version of the Dragon 2. The flight will reuse the first phase of the same Falcon 9 that launched the Crude Demo-2 mission. In May, to send Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the space station. (Submitted by Ken Bin)
The delay in the H3 rocket debut was confirmed. The first launch of the new Japanese H3 launch vehicle has been delayed by issues with two components of the rocket’s main engine, according to Space News reports. JXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the main contractor for H3, aimed to launch by the end of 2020 before exploring the issues in May.
You’ve got to see the FTP blade … Now, the rocket will be launched on April 1, 2021 in Japan’s fiscal year 2021. Problems were found with the combustion chamber and turbompump of the new LE-9 engine. According to JXA, “fatigue fracture surfaces were confirmed in the inner wall of the combustion chamber and in the aperture area of the FTP blade of the turbo pump.” (Submitted by Ken Bin)
Russian spaceport officials are deployed from left and right. The head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, has worked tirelessly to see many of the country’s top spaceport officials fired, arrested or both. Most recently, on November 27, Rogozin fired the leader of the research center of the Center for Land-Based Space Infrastructure, which operates all space stations in Russia. Andrei Okhlopkov, the leader of the Roscosmos subsidiary, was previously reprimanded by Rogozin for “repeated shortcomings in his work.”
Wait, there’s more … Earlier this month, Vladimir Zuk, the center’s chief engineer who manages Russian spaceports, was arrested. Several other key officials who have been linked to Vostoch’s Cosmodrome under development since 2011 and aim to reduce Russia’s dependence on Kazakhstan’s Baikonur Cosmodrome have also been released recently. Spaceport has been mired in corruption since construction began.
NASA confirms return of 1960 centurion booster. Scientists have confirmed that the Neuro-Earth Ject Budget 2020 SO is, in fact, a 1960s Centaur rocket booster. The first discovery came in September, an analysis of the orbit of the 2020 SO found that the object had come close to the Earth a few times over the decades, an approach in 1966 bringing it close enough to the possibility that it originated from the Earth. This time coincided with the launch of the 1966 Surveyor 2 mission to the moon, NASA said.
Using spectra data … To confirm this, a team led by Vijnan Reddy, an associate professor at the University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and a planetary scientist, performed a 2020 SO spectroscopy using the NASA telescope on the Hawaiian monkeys. Reddy’s team observed one more centurion rocket booster to get one more spectrum. The rocket was launched in 1971 and delivered a communications satellite in geostationary transfer orbit. With these new data, Reddy and his team compared it to the 2020 SO and found that the Spectra is compatible with each other, so the 2020 SO definitely concludes that it is also a Centaur rocket booster. (Submitted by Tfargo04)
