Tag: RFA

German rocket startup Rocket Factory Augsburg replaces its CEO

9:27 am

Screen capture of test failure
Screen capture from video of test failure in August 2024.
Note the flame shooting out sideways.

In a major managerial shake-up as it preps for its first launch attempt later this year, the German rocket startup Rocket Factory Augsburg has replaced its CEO, switching from someone with more general business experience to a CEO with a lot of direct experience in the space industry itself.

In an April 11 statement not widely publicized by the company, RFA announced that Stefan Tweraser, who had been chief executive since October 2021, had been replaced by Indulis Kalnins.

The announcement did not give a reason for the change, but it suggested that the company was seeking someone with expertise in the aerospace industry to lead the company. Kalnins is on the aerospace faculty of a German university, Hochschule Bremen, and has been managing director of OHB Cosmos, which focused on launch services.

…Tweraser, by contrast, came from outside the space industry. He joined RFA after past work that included being a consultant at McKinsey & Company, country director for the DACH (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) region at Google and executive at music streaming company Deezer. [emphasis mine]

The highlighted phrase provides I think the explanation for the change. The company had hoped to launch last year, but had a major failure during a static fire engine test on the launchpad, destroying the rocket first stage. The company has probably decided it needed someone in charge who had some hands-on experience with launchpad operations.

One comment

Rocket Factory Augsburg releases footage of 1st stage failure during static fire test

9:03 am

The German rocket startup Rocket Factory Augsburg today released the film footage it took during the failed 9-engine static fire test of its 1st stage last week.

I have embedded that footage below.

As the company’s CEO noted two days ago, the company has identified the cause as a fire in an oxygen pump which they think was unrelated to the engine design. This explanation remains puzzling, however. If the problem was not engine design, it suggests instead some other quality control error, which it is even more important to identify in order to prevent such errors in the future.

The video provides numerous angles of the failure, including one that captured the moment when the first stage fell over. As the CEO noted, it fortunately fell in the right direction, missing critical launchpad equipment and thus reducing significantly the damage to the pad.
» Read more

2 comments

Rocket Factory identifies cause of failure during rocket static fire test

9:14 am

According to Rocket Factory Augsburg, its investigation into the explosion during the first full nine-engine static fire test of its RFA-1 rocket earlier this week has identified the cause of the failure.

In an update on LinkedIn on 22 August, RFA COO Dr. Stefan Brieschenk announced that the company had completed an initial internal review. In what Dr. Brieschenk describes as “very preliminary” findings, he explains that the company has identified an “oxygen fire in one of the turbopumps” as the root cause of the incident. “That engine and that turbopump have run before without issues, wrote Dr. Brieschenk. “Eight engines ignited. We had multiple back-up and safety systems in place that were supposed to shut everything down – but things did not align on Monday as planned.”

As he notes, this is very preliminary. The company probably still does not know why the fire occurred in that turbopump, and it will need to find out in order to fix the problem. And without that fix, it is almost certain the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) will not issue the company a launch license when a new first stage is built and delivered to the Saxavord spaceport in the Shetland Islands where the launch is planned.

All in all, expect a delay of at least one year before that launch can occur. Base on the CAA’s past history, that delay could easily extend to two years.

Leave a comment

Rocket Factory Augsburg’s rocket fails during 9-engine static fire test

9:21 am

Screen capture of test failure
Screen capture from video of test failure.
Note the flame shooting out sideways.

During a static test yesterday of Rocket Factory Augsburg’s RFA-1 rocket, the first using all nine first stage engines, the rocket experienced what the company called an “anomaly” early in the test, causing a major fire and explosion.

The company’s statement also said the launchpad was “saved” and no one was injured.

I have embedded below a clip from a BBC video of the event. A company official had said only yesterday that it hoped to launch in a matter of weeks, though that official had given no word on whether the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) had issued a launch license. I suspect he hoped this test would be successful and the CAA would then issue the license. That won’t happen now.

The test took place at the new commercial Saxavord spaceport in the Shetland Islands, which has also struggled in the past two years to get full licensing from the CAA. It has obtained those licenses, but it would not be surprising if this failure will cause the CAA — which appears very risk adverse — to reconsider its approvals.

Until this failure, Rocket Factory appeared to be in the lead among the new European rocket startups to complete its first launch. That now changes. The Spanish startup PLD hopes to launch from French Guiana in 2025, and is presently building its launchpad there. The UK startup Orbex also hopes to launch in 2025, but it wants to launch from the Sutherland spaceport in Scotland, has faced significant regulatory delays over the past two years from the CAA, and will now likely face further delays because of this failure. Another German startup, Hyimpulse, has already completed a suborbital test launch from Australia, but has not set a date for an orbital test. It originally hoped to launch from Saxavord in 2025, but has been looking for alternatives recently. Finally, the German startup Isar Aerospace has a deal to launch from the Andoya spaceport in Norway, but has announced no launch date.
» Read more

2 comments

France’s space agency puts out calls for rocket companies to lease the French Guiana launchpad formerly used by Russia’s Soyuz rocket

10:51 am

Capitalism in space: France’s space agency CNES has now issued a request for commercial rocket companies to bid on leasing the launchpad formerly used by Russia to launch its Soyuz rocket from French Guiana.

The launchpad became available after the European Space Agency (ESA) broke off its partnerships with Russia in February 2022.

Following the cessation of Soyuz launches, it was agreed that ESA would transfer ownership of the site back to CNES under the provision that it would host two new launch systems. The first will be selected by CNES as part of its recently published call. The second will be selected by ESA as part of the agency’s launcher challenge, which was publically announced in late 2023.

According to the CNES call, prospective candidate vehicles will be required to be capable of deploying payloads of at least 1.5 tonnes into low Earth orbit. Additionally, a maiden flight from the launch site will need to be completed no later than 2027. This will drastically limit the potential bidders.

The article at the link lists three potential bidders, Rocket Factory Augsburg, Maiaspace, and Avio. The first two are rocket startups, having not yet launched a rocket. Avio is the lead contractor for Arianespace’s Vega family of rockets, so it already has experience with an operational rocket, though that rocket is presently grounded due to recent launch failures.

There are a number of other rocket startups in Europe, including PLD in Spain and Hyimpulse and Isar in Germany. The incentive to bid for this launchpad might encourage them to upgrade their rocket to meet the bidding requirements.

4 comments

UK government to invest £10 million in Saxavord spaceport

9:45 am

Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea
Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea.

The government of the United Kingdom announced yesterday that it will directly invest £10 million in the Saxavord spaceport being built on one of the Shetland Islands, as shown on the map to the right.

Coming in addition to around £40 million of private investment, the government funding will allow SaxaVord to accelerate its capital works programme to ensure it is ready to support the first orbital launch.

That capital works program was forced to shut down last year when red tape at the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) delayed the licensing of Saxavord. It could be this grant has been issued partly to repay the losses the spaceport company experienced due to those bureaucratic delays. The timing kind of reinforces this speculation, as only yesterday Saxavord got its spaceport license approved, though other approvals remain pending.

All this news suggests strongly that the first test flight at Saxavord by the German rocket startup Rocket Factory Augsburg will occur later this year, as promised.

Meanwhile, the other spaceport in Sutherland must be wondering if it can get similar government aid, or if the government is now playing favorites.

Leave a comment

Is the Saxavord spaceport in the UK about to finally get approved for launches?

9:22 am

Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea
Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea.

According to the head of the Saxavord spaceport in the UK, it is finally poised to get all the necessary approvals from the government of the United Kingdom that will allow the first launches before the end of this year.

Following on from the CAA licence being granted just before Christmas, management at SaxaVord Spaceport is confident it will receive its ‘range licence’ later this month to finally become a “fully-fledged spaceport”. This second licence, also issued by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), allows rockets launched from SaxaVord to use the airspace.

Sounds great, eh? Except that the spaceport is still waiting approval from a local commission of its plan for allowing spectators to watch launches. In addition, no launch license has yet been issued to any rocket company. The German company Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) is planning to take over one specific launchpad at Saxavord where it hopes to do as many as ten launches per year, with the first test launch later this year. The UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has not yet issued that license.

Another rocket startup, ABL, is also waiting CAA approvals. Its first test launch (which failed in January 2023) was conducted in Alaska, with a second launch planned there in the next month or so. If successful the company hopes to launch regularly from Saxavord, assuming the CAA gives it approval.

Saxavord submitted its license applications to the CAA in November 2022, with the hope launches could begin in 2023. It took the CAA however more than a year to issue the spaceport license, and it still has not issued the range license, nor has it issued RFA any launch licenses yet. For these companies to prosper the government approval process has got to be streamlined.

Leave a comment

Two new European rocket startups sign deal with France to launch from French Guiana

11:28 am

The French space agency CNES today signed agreements with two different European smallsat rocket startups, Spain’s PLD Space and Germany’s Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA), allowing each to launch from France’s old launchpad in French Guiana that was used in the 1970s by its long abandoned Diamant rocket.

From the RFA press release:

Until now, the launch pad in Kourou has only been used by CNES for its Diamant rocket in the 1970s. Now the launch complex is to be given a new purpose, in the tradition of opening access to space through innovative and groundbreaking ventures. As such, RFA is one of the first NewSpace companies to be given the opportunity to use it. The new launch pad will be upgraded and equipped in the coming years with the aim of being used for launches from 2025.

These agreements are part of a slew that have come out of Europe in the past year or so that all indicate that the European Space Agency (ESA) and its partners have finally abandoned any attempts to build rockets, and are instead looking to private enterprise to do it for them. First Germany encouraged private rocket startups, independent of Arianespace and ESA. Then Spain followed with PLD Space. Then Arianespace, the commercial arm of ESA that for decades built all rockets for ESA, announced it was making agreements with these startups to have them launch payloads instead.

These new deals today indicate that France has now joined the rush to private enterprise, which is a very significant development as France as always been the leader in having ESA build its own rockets through Arianespace. It appears it is now looking away from government-run space.

All these actions are also suggest a dim future for ArianeGoup’s Ariane-6 rocket, built under the old system but with an attempt to give private enterprise more power, with ArianeGroup, not Arianespace, owning and controlling it. Its design however was dictated largely by ESA, thus resulting in a rocket that is too expensive and therefore not competitive.

The long term result will be greater competition, both in Europe and worldwide, which in turn is going to fuel a renaissance in rocket development, which in turn is going to speed the exploration and colonization of the rest of the solar system.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.

One comment

German rocket startup signs deal with UK spaceport

10:17 am

Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA), a German rocket startup, has signed a deal with the SaxaVord spaceport in the Shetland Islands of Scotland to fly its first launch from there later this year.

Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) has signed a multi-year deal with the SaxaVord spaceport, being built in Unst, for the first launch of its satellite-carrying rockets. After testing at the site in mid-2023, it hopes to launch to a 500km orbit by the end of the year.

Because of the failure of the Virgin Orbit launch from Cornwall earlier this week, the honor of being the first orbital launch from within the United Kingdom remains ungrabbed. Both SaxaVord and Spaceport Sutherland, also in Scotland but at a different location, are now competing for that honor. Both now have planned launches this year, assuming the Civil Aviation Authority of the UK can issue a permit in less than fifteen months.

Meanwhile, Rocket Factory is competing with two other German startups for the honor of being the first commercial private European rocket company to reach orbit.

2 comments

Rocket Factory Augsburg signs deal to use German engine test facility

10:10 am

Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA), one of three German rocket startups pushing to begin test launches next year, has signed a contract with Germany’s aerospace agency DLR to use of its engine test facility for static fire tests of its Helix engine.

RFA announced the deal at the Space Tech Expo Europe in Bremen, Germany, Nov. 16, which will allow RFA to use the P2.4 test site in Lampoldshausen. DLR provides the basic infrastructure while RFA brings its own test stand and supporting infrastructure.

Test stands in Lampoldshausen have so far only been used by DLR, the European Space Agency and ArianeGroup.

The new test stand will add to RFA engine testing capacity already established in Esrange in northern Sweden, where the company has been conducting testing on the Helix engine for the RFA One launcher. Testing will continue in Sweden but the new development simplifies logistics and bureaucracy related to import and export rules. [emphasis mine]

The highlighted sentence is the news. The German government has decided to break the monopoly held by government related operations of these facilities, and open up their use to private independent commercial companies.

RFA says it already has a dozen customers, and hopes to begin commercial launches by ’24.

One comment

German rocket company successfully tests first stage to failure

9:55 pm

Capitalism in space: The German startup rocket company Rocket Factory Augsburg has successfully completed a tank pressure test of its rocket’s core first stage, testing that stage to failure.

The German startup Rocket Factory Augsburg, or RFA, has concluded another test of their RFA One rocket. In the test, the company performed a destructive cryogenic pressure test of their first stage prototype. The company has shown a video in which the prototype stage broke apart after it was fueled with cryogenic nitrogen to test the quality of the welds and determine the pressure at which the structure fails.

The milestone is the latest for the company which is aiming to develop a reusable launch vehicle for small payloads. The first flight of RFA One is currently slated for late 2022, following more testing and development.

The video of the test, with a dramatic soundtrack (as has sadly become the practice today since all life always has its own soundtrack) can be seen at the link.

This company is one of three German private rocket startups vying to enter the smallsat launch market — Isar, RFA, and HyImpulse — with two hoping to make their first launch next year.

Leave a comment