SpaceX and Rocket Lab complete launches
Both SpaceX and Rocket Lab successfully completed launches today. First SpaceX launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral. The first stage completed its ninth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
Shortly thereafter, Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket lifted off from one of its launchpads in New Zealand, placing two technology demonstration satellites in orbit, one testing a solar sail from NASA and the other from South Korea testing a cubesat doing optical observations of Earth. Though the first stage had the markings of a stage designed for resuse, there was no indication in the company’s live stream of any attempt to recover it.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
42 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
5 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 49 to 28, while SpaceX by itself still leads the rest of the world, including other American companies, 42 to 35.
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Both SpaceX and Rocket Lab successfully completed launches today. First SpaceX launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral. The first stage completed its ninth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
Shortly thereafter, Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket lifted off from one of its launchpads in New Zealand, placing two technology demonstration satellites in orbit, one testing a solar sail from NASA and the other from South Korea testing a cubesat doing optical observations of Earth. Though the first stage had the markings of a stage designed for resuse, there was no indication in the company’s live stream of any attempt to recover it.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
42 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
5 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 49 to 28, while SpaceX by itself still leads the rest of the world, including other American companies, 42 to 35.
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.
This was Electron’s 42nd successful orbital launch, moving it into a tie with Northrop Grumman’s Pegasus for the second most prolific smallsat launcher in history. LTV’s Scout will retain its record of 87 for a while yet, I should think.
mkent: Were those 87 Scout launches all orbital? I did not think it had that many orbital launches.
Bob: I thought so when I typed that, but checking my records, I find 122 total Scouts launched across 21 flown variants, breaking down into 90 successful orbital flights, 12 failed orbital flight attempts, and 20 intentional suborbital flights. Payload to orbit of the orbital variants ranged from a low of 6 kg to a high of 210 kg, so both Pegasus and Electron have Scout beat quite handily in that department.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Scout_launches
I counted 97 successful orbital launches. 95 low Earth orbit and 2 high orbit.
It is exciting that Rocket Lab has exceeded monthly launches and is now averaging one every 3½ weeks.
Edward: Wikipedia? How quaint. :-)
That might be where I was remembering 87 successful orbital launches from.
”I counted 97 successful orbital launches. 95 low Earth orbit and 2 high orbit.”
Are you sure? I counted 87 successful orbital launches: 85 LEO and 2 HEO. That figure also matches the “Launches By Vehicle” and “Launches By Decade” charts on that page.
Either way, Electron has a ways to go to match that record
mkent,
“Are you sure?”
Well, that is why I put in the link, just in case I cannot count on my fingers correctly. I haven’t verified your count, but since it matches the other, I will trust that it is correct.