Tuesday, January 19, 2021

Virgin Orbit Successfully Launches First Rocket Into Space

Mojave-based Virgin Orbit, which is developing space launch technology which uses a modified 747 to launch rocket payloads into space, successfully launched its first rocket into space from the Southern California coast on Sunday. The company's LauncherDemo2 mission--which took off from Mojave, before launching a rocket off the coast of Santa Cruz Island--carried 9 CubeSat satellites into Low Earth Orbit. The CubeSat payloads were all delivered into space for NASA. The launch is the first successful launch for Virgin Orbit, which saw an earlier failure of the same launch system in May of 2020. The successful launch adds Virgin Orbit to a growing list of Southern California companies able to launch payloads into space, including SpaceX and Rocket Lab. Virgin Orbit competes most directly against Rocket Lab, which also is focused on small satellite payloads.