Huntington Beach, California-based startup Rocket Lab launched seven small satellites to low-Earth orbit on the company’s seventh flight, a mission dubbed “Make It Rain” early this morning (June 29).
The company’s two-stage Electron booster rocket lifted off from their Launch Complex 1 on the Mahia Peninsula in New Zealand at 12.30 A.M. Eastern time (4.30 P.M. local time) and 56 minutes later, all seven small satellites were deployed into their intended low-Earth orbits.
“Congratulations to the dedicated teams behind the payloads on this mission, and also to our team for another flawless Electron launch,” Rocket Lab founder and CEO, Peter Beck, said in a statement.
“It’s a privilege to provide tailored and reliable access to space for small satellites like these, giving each one a smooth ride to orbit and precise deployment, even in a rideshare arrangement.”
Today’s launch is the seventh time the Electron rocket has flown. This includes test flights and in 2019, three missions, including the “Two Thumbs Up” mission in March this year and the “That’s a Funny Looking Cactus” in May. Rocket Lab gives each mission a nickname. “Make It Rain” is a reference to Seattle, the famously wet city that serves as the home base of Spaceflight, the rideshare provider that procured the mission.
Spaceflight’s first rideshare mission
Seattle-based Spaceflight is a leading satellite rideshare and mission management provider. Today’s rideshare mission is just the first of five launches scheduled with Rocket Lab this year, according to a press release published earlier this month.
The largest satellite on today's mission is the BlackSky_Inc Global3 Earth observation microsat, seen here during integration onto Electron’s Kick Stage at LC-1. Thanks to the Kick Stage, we can place all satellites on today’s mission into precise and individual orbits. NVqG0sMzXA
— Rocket Lab (@RocketLab) June 26, 2019
“We’re looking forward to not only our inaugural flight with Rocket Lab but a long-term partnership to increase access to space via frequent launches,” said Curt Blake, CEO of Spaceflight. “Having the Electron in our arsenal of small launch vehicles provides our customers with a low-cost, flexible option to get on orbit.”
Upstart Rocket Lab is already cementing itself as a leader in the smallsat launcher market. The company’s Electron two-stage booster is 57 feet tall and four feet wide (17 by 1.2 meters). The Electron can loft a maximum of about 500 pounds (225 kilograms) on each roughly $5 million per liftoff.
Today’s mission consisted of a total payload of 176 pounds (80 kilograms). The satellites included the Global-3, a satellite for the Earth-imaging company BlackSky, and was the largest satellite on the launch at 60 kilograms.
Also onboard were two CubeSats for U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) Prometheus, and two SpaceBEE CubeSats from U.S. startup Swarm Technologies. Also included is the CubeSat ACRUX-1, launched for the Melbourne Space Program, an educational organization that gives Australian students hands-on experience with space projects, according to Space.com.
Today’s mission will lift off from Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand, but progress on our second launch site is coming along nicely too. Rocket Lab Launch Complex 2 at Wallops Island, Virginia is on track to be operational by the end of the year. xv3oRl2rof
— Rocket Lab (@RocketLab) June 29, 2019
The future looks bright for Rocket Lab
Rocket Lab would like to conduct one launch a month through the end of 2019, increasing that number to two a month in 2020. This will be made possible by the construction of a new launch facility at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.
So far, the company has now launched 35 satellites since its first commercial flight in January 2018, with an impressive 100 percent mission success rate for its customers.
