Rocket Lab successfully completes first launch from the U.S.
Using its Electron rocket, Rocket Lab yesterday placed three smallsats into orbit, launching for the first time from Wallops Island in Virginia.
The company now has three launchpads, one in Wallops and two in New Zealand. Expect its launch pace in 2023 to ramp up to, at a minimum, once per month.
The 2023 launch race:
5 China
5 SpaceX
1 Rocket Lab
In the national rankings, the U.S. leads China, 6 to 5. No one else has yet launched, though Japan plans a launch today.
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Using its Electron rocket, Rocket Lab yesterday placed three smallsats into orbit, launching for the first time from Wallops Island in Virginia.
The company now has three launchpads, one in Wallops and two in New Zealand. Expect its launch pace in 2023 to ramp up to, at a minimum, once per month.
The 2023 launch race:
5 China
5 SpaceX
1 Rocket Lab
In the national rankings, the U.S. leads China, 6 to 5. No one else has yet launched, though Japan plans a launch today.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Is this the first private company to successfully launch from two different continents, let alone two different countries?
Technically, I don’t think New Zealand is a continent.
New Zealand thinks it is https://www.snexplores.org/article/zealandia-continent
Zealandia is a continent like I’m a genius billionaire. You just can’t see all my hidden wealth and brains, and neither can I.
Two different landmasses? Two different countries?
Maybe not even then. Roscosmos, after all, operated Soyuz ST from not just Russia/Kazakhstan, but also from Arianespace’s launch facilities in Korou, French Guiana. Of course, all their Korou operations are not suspended, and very unlikely to ever resume again…
You know I had never looked. I had always assumed it was close enough to be considered part of the Continent of Australia. But apparently not.
Okay, so first private space company to launch from two countries. And from two hemispheres, then?
Is Roscosmos really a private company? I mean the name is short for State Space Corporation.. like Arianespace, which is simply a commercial extension of ESA.
New Zealand is part of what is called Oceana, which is often treated as a continent by those who believe in Oceana. New Zealand has been considered a microcontinent. I think that the point is that Rocket Lab has successfully navigated different governments in opposite sides of the planet to launch their rocket, and since they had such a long delay and Virgin Orbit had a long delay in England, it seems that governments have a difficult time coping with private companies. It is a good thing that governments are set up to serve themselves and not their citizens, otherwise they would be doing a poor job of governance.
Soyuz has also launched from different continents, but that is a government rocket, launched by both a somewhat-private-but-mostly-government company on South America and by a couple of governments on Eurasia. It launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan — possibly the Asian part of the country — from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in European Russia, and from the Guiana Space Centre in South America. For the most part, the associated governments have gotten along, but relationships are strained at the moment.
New Zealand is part of Oceania: Australia, NZ and the Southern Pacific island groups. Not technically a continent but you’ll find oceanic island groups are included in the statistics of the continents that they’re geographically closest to. For example many Indian ocean islands are considered part of either Africa or Asia.
I’m becoming incontinent over this discussion.
Perhaps we should put this question on the continental shelf.
In the meantime, I am not the only one asking about different hemispheres.
https://twitter.com/Peter_J_Beck/status/1618520659478577153