Arianespace celebrated the inaugural flight of Europe’s light-lift Vega rocket today, marking an important milestone for the group that now claims to cater for a full range of commercial and governmental launch needs.
Vega, which can accommodate…
Arianespace celebrated the inaugural flight of Europe’s light-lift Vega rocket today, marking an important milestone for the group that now claims to cater for a full range of commercial and governmental launch needs.
Vega, which can accommodate spacecraft weighing 300kg-2500kg, was successfully launched from Kourou, French Guiana, at 10am (GMT) on 13 February, carrying a total of nine small satellites.
The rocket is now validated to take its place amongst Arianespace’s rocket portfolio, which also includes the Ariane 5 heavy-lifter, and the Soyuz medium-class vehicle that it has been launching from Kourou from October 2011.
“In a little more than three months, Europe has increased the number of launchers it operates from one to three, widening significantly the range of launch services offered by the European operator Arianespace,” said Jacques Dordain, director general of the European Space Agency (ESA).
“There is not anymore one single European satellite which cannot be launched by a European launcher service.”
The next Vega flight is scheduled for early 2013, when it will lift ESA’s Proba-V remote sensing bird and multiple auxiliary payloads.
Vega’s first commercial contract was announced last December, with Arianespace being picked after open competition to launch earth observation birds Sentinel-2B and Sentinel-3B between 2014 and 2016. These two birds, which are respectively being built by Astrium Satellites and Thales Alenia Space, are under ESA’s Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) programme.
ESA also claims to be negotiating other undisclosed commercial contracts for the Vega launch vehicle.
Meanwhile in the US, the CEO of nascent launch provider SpaceX has reaffirmed plans for an eventual IPO, this time pointing to an offering date in 2013.
Elon Musk, who sold shares in his electric car business Telsa Motors in 2010, and is reportedly preparing to list his renewable energy firm SolarCity this year, told Bloomberg that there was a good chance of SpaceX going public next year.
Musk had previously pointed to an end of 2012 date for the IPO, which would support the commercial validity of its long-term business model and combat the scepticism from the rest of the launch sector over its relatively cheap launch products.
