Tag: Arianespace

Italian subcontractor for Arianespace misplaces two rocket tanks

8:58 am

This story is hard to believe but true: The Italian company Avio, one of the subcontractors for Arianespace that builds its smaller rockets Vega and Vega-C, apparently misplaced two rocket tanks that were to be used on the Vega rocket’s last launch, thus preventing that launch entirely.

The two propellant tanks that went missing were housed in an Avio production department in Colleferro that had undergone renovation work. At some point following the completion of the renovations, the two tanks were found to be missing.

According to the initial source, the tanks had not been entered into a company-wide asset management system that tracked the location of all vital Avio components. This ensured that the teams tasked with investigating the disappearance had very little to go on when beginning their search for the missing tanks.

Despite the futility of the search, the tanks were eventually found. This was, however, not the good news Avio had hoped for. The tanks are, unfortunately, not in a usable state. They had been crushed and were found alongside metal scraps in a landfill.

The tanks power Vega’s fourth stage that deploys satellites in orbit. They were to be used on the final flight of Vega, which has been delayed repeatedly for unexplained reasons. We now know the reason.

Because this was the final flight, however, the tanks cannot be replaced because the Vega production line has been shut down. The company is considering using two of the four qualification tanks first built more than a decade ago when Vega was first being tested, but those were test tanks and have been sitting unused for as long. It will be difficult to determine their reliability.

Europe’s government-run rocket program thus at present has no rocket capable of launching. Its Ariane-5 is retired. Its Vega cannot launch. Its Vega-C, which replaces the Vega, remains grounded due to a launch failure in December 2022, with the next launch expected no earlier than late in 2024. And its new Ariane-6 rocket won’t do its first launch until the summer of 2024, at the earliest.

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Amazon signs launch contract with SpaceX

9:32 am

Amazon on December 1, 2023 announced it has signed a three-launch contract with SpaceX to place its Kuiper satellites into orbit, supplementing the launch contracts it presently has with ULA, Arianespace, and Blue Origin. From the Amazon press release:

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 is a reusable, two-stage launch vehicle designed for the reliable and safe transport of people and payloads into Earth orbit and beyond, and it has completed more than 270 successful launches to date. Project Kuiper has contracted three Falcon 9 launches, and these missions are targeted to lift off beginning in mid-2025.

In 2022 Amazon had signed contracts with the other three launch companies, with ULA getting 38 Vulcan launches (in addition to 9 already signed for its Atlas-5), Arianespace getting 18 Ariane-6 launches, and Blue Origin getting 12 New Glenn launches.

The problem however is that, except for the Atlas-5, none of these rockets has yet completed its first flight. Since Amazon’s FCC license requires it to get half of its constellation of 3,200+ satellites into orbit by 2026 or face penalties, the uncertainty of these rockets has probably forced Amazon management to consider SpaceX, despite likely hostility to such a deal from Jeff Bezos (owner of Blue Origin and founder of Amazon).

Amazon management also probably decided to sign this deal because of a lawsuit filed in September 2023 by company stockholders, accusing the management of neglience because it never even considered SpaceX in earlier contract negotiations while giving favoritism to Bezos’s company Blue Origin. At that time Amazon had already paid these launch companies about $1.7 billion, with Blue Origin getting $585 million, though not one rocket has yet launched, with Blue Origin showing no evidence that a launch coming anytime soon.

The impression of a conflict of interest by Amazon’s board of directors appeared very obvious. This new SpaceX contract weakens that accusation.

More important the deal will help Amazon actually get its satellites into orbit. It appears that reality is finally biting at Amazon, and its management has realized that the three companies they have been relying on might not be up to the job (especially Blue Origin).

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Amazon’s first two Kuiper satellites in orbit worked exactly as planned

2:55 pm

Amazon announced today that its first two Kuiper satellites, launched into orbit by ULA’s Atlas-5 rocket on October 6, 2023, have worked exactly as planned, thus allowing the company to begin building operational satellites.

With the prototypes’ testing in space now complete, Badyal said Amazon plans to begin building the first production Kuiper satellites in December and launch the first satellites for its network in the “latter part of the first half” of 2024. Badyal emphasized that Amazon wasn’t sure what performance to expect from the prototype satellites, since “you don’t know how well it’s going to work in space.”

“They’re working brilliantly,” Badyal said.

The need of Amazon to start launching lots of satellites next year — in order to meet its FCC license requirements to put half of its 3,000+ constellation in orbit by 2026 — puts great pressure on ULA, Blue Origin, and Arianespace to get their new but as yet unlaunchd rockets operating. All three have big launch contracts with Amazon, but none presently appear to have the capability to meet the demands of those contracts.

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ESA completes investigation of Vega-C rocket failure

5:10 pm

The European Space Agency (ESA) today released its completed investigation of December 2022 launch failure of its Vega-C rocket’s second stage.

One of the recommendations was to implement a (delta-)qualification of the nozzle with a new Carbon-Carbon throat insert material different from that previously used on the Zefiro40, the solid rocket booster of the Vega-C second stage. On 28 June 2023, a static firing test of the modified Zefiro40 engine took place at the test bench in Salto di Quirra in Italy. During the test the engine nozzle suffered significant damages.

ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher has set up an Independent Enquiry Commission chaired by the ESA Inspector General, Giovanni Colangelo, and composed of experts from CNES, ASI, ESA, Arianespace and academia to understand the cause of the test anomaly and propose recommendations.

The Independent Enquiry Commission concluded that in the current design of the nozzle, the combination of the geometry of the Carbon-Carbon throat insert and the different thermo-mechanical properties of the new material caused progressive damage of other adjacent nozzle parts and a progressive degradation eventually leading to the nozzle’s failure.

In other words, the changes implemented based on the initial investigation that was completed in March did not work. The nozzle needs to redesigned, and will also require at least two more static fire engine tests to be certified.

At the moment ESA officials are predicting that Vega-C will resume launches in the fourth quarter of next year, but do not put any money on that prediction.

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Update on the status of Vulcan, Ariane-6, and New Glenn

9:48 am

Link here. This excellent article is focused on whether these three new rockets, none of which has yet completed its first test flight, will be able to meet their launch contract obligations with Amazon, which needs to launch at least 1,600 satellites of its Kuiper broadband constellation by July 2026 to meet its FCC license requirements. Those requirements also obligate Amazon to have the full constellation of about 3,200 satellites in orbit by July 2029.

The launch contracts to these three untried rockets was the largest such contract ever issued, involving 83 launches and billions of dollars.

To sum up where things stand in terms of the first test launch of each rocket:
» Read more

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Amazon investors sue company for not considering SpaceX as potential launch provider

8:56 am

In a lawsuit filed by Amazon investors, they claim that the company’s decision to give major and expensive launch contracts to Arianespace, ULA, and Blue Origin to put its planned 3,200 Kuiper satellite constellation into orbit but never even consider using SpaceX indicates a failure at due diligence for the shareholders as well as a possible conflict of interest.

The plaintiff’s biggest concern was the decision to give Blue Origin the contract.

The suit, filed by Amazon shareholders the Cleveland Bakers and Teamsters Pension Fund, alleges that the board spent less than 40 minutes approving the launch agreements for Amazon’s Project Kuiper mega-constellation, while not even considering leading launch company (and Blue Origin rival) SpaceX. “Amazon’s directors likely devoted barely an hour before blindly signing off on funneling […] Amazon’s money to Bezos’ unproven, struggling rocket company,” the suit says. The plaintiffs say the board failed to protect the negotiation process “from Bezos’ glaring conflict of interest.”

It appears these investors might have a point, as so far Amazon has paid these launch companies about $1.7 billion, with Blue Origin getting $585 million, though not one satellite has yet launched. Moreover, it appears from all counts that it will be very difficult for these companies — especially Blue Origin — to complete the required missions necessary to get into orbit half of Amazon’s constellation by 2026, as required by its FCC license.

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Europe’s Ariane-5 rocket completes its last launch

3:30 pm

The Ariane-5 rocket today successfully completed its final launch, lifting off from French Guiana and placing two communications satellites into orbit.

At the moment Europe has no capability of putting anything into orbit. Ariane-5 is retired. Ariane-6, its replacement, is far behind schedule will probably not make its first test flight until next year. The Vega-C rocket is grounded because of a launch failure in December 2022.

This was only the second launch for Europe in 2023, so the the leader board in the 2023 launch race remains the same:

44 SpaceX
24 China
9 Russia
5 Rocket Lab

In successful launches, American private enterprise still leads China 50 to 24 in the national rankings, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world combined, excluding American companies, 44 to 42.

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The last Ariane-5 launch scheduled for July 4th

10:01 am

Arianespace has now scheduled the last Ariane-5 launch for July 4, 2023, after a delay caused by a problem with “the pyrotechnic transmission lines” on the rocket, requiring their replacement.

The replacement happened faster than originally expected. The launch will place a French military communications satellite into orbit as well as a German experimental communications satellite.

After this launch, Europe will temporarily be without any method for launching its own payloads, for the first time this century. Its Vega-C rocket is presently grounded due to a launch failure in December 2022, and the Ariane-6 rocket that was to replace the Ariane-5 is years behind schedule, and not expected to fly until 2024. The original plan was for there to be an overlap between the two rockets, but the delays ended that plan.

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PLD’s first suborbital test launch aborted just prior to launch

1:07 pm

According to company officials, the first suborbital test launch of PLD Miura-1 rocket was aborted today just prior to launch because some of the umbilical fuel and power lines failed to disconnect as planned.

The launch was from PLD’s launch site in Spain. No word when the company will try again. Before it can build its orbital Miura-5 rocket it needs the test data from this suborbital launch.

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Tomorrow’s final launch of Europe’s Ariane-5 rocket delayed indefinitely

2:01 pm

Arianespace officials today cancelled tomorrow’s final launch of its Ariane-5 rocket — supposedly to be replaced by the not-yet-flown Ariane-6, citing issues with “three pyrotechnical transmission lines that are associated with the Ariane 5’s solid rocket boosters.”

No new launch date has been set. There is the possibility that to resolve this issue the rocket will have to be rolled back to its assembly building and destacked. If so, the launch will be delayed months.

At the moment, Europe has only managed one launch in 2023, a far cry from the seven to twelve launches it used to do annually, before SpaceX came along and offered a cheaper rocket that could launch more frequently and quicker.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.

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Arianespace signs deal with Spanish rocket startup PLD

8:58 am

Following up with its agreement with the UK rocket startup Orbex, Arianespace yesterday also signed a deal with the Spanish rocket startup PLD to study using that company’s as-yet-unflown Miura-5 rocket.

Like the Orbex deal, this agreement makes it possible for Arianespace to arrange launches using PLD’s rocket. It also tells us that Arianespace and the European Space Agency are shifting from designing and building their own rockets — a process that has failed to produce any profit and had presently left Europe with no launch capability — to acting simply as a customer buying that capability from independent competing private companies.

For this to work however both Orbex and PLD will have to get their rockets off the ground.

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Arianespace signs deal to study the possibility of using Orbex’s commercial rocket for launches

5:20 pm

In what must be considered a major sea change in Europe, Arianespace — the European Space Agency’s (ESA) official commercial launch company — has now signed a deal with Orbex, a rocket startup based in the United Kingdom, to study the possibility of using Orbex’s not-yet-launched Prime rocket for future European launches.

In particular, it is expected that future collaboration would be particularly beneficial for customers planning small satellite constellations, providing a flexible solution for Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) payloads. Light and heavy-lift launch vehicles could jointly support customers in deploying their initial constellations into the required orbital planes, provide precise injections of a smaller number of satellites through dedicated missions, as well as provide replenishment and replacement launches.

While the ESA began developing a partnership with Orbex back in 2021 when it awarded Orbex a development contract worth 7.45 million euros, for Arianespace to go directly to this independent company for launch services suggests the new policy of ESA to stop developing its own rockets but to become a customer hiring the rockets of private companies is gaining steam.

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