aerospace firefly It sent its Alpha rocket into orbit this morning, and the company transported a Lockheed Martin payload into space. However, the company has yet to inform the public whether it successfully deployed the satellite into its target orbit, which could suggest a problem with the rocket's second stage.
Today's launch marks the fourth flight of Firefly's Alpha rocket. The vehicle took off from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base at 9:32 a.m. local time. The mission, called Fly the Lightning, was a commercial launch for customer Lockheed Martin. The rocket carried the payload of Lockheed's demonstrator, called the Electronically Steerable Antenna (ESA) technology demonstrator, into low-Earth orbit.
Around 9:40 a.m. local time, Firefly tweeted which would re-ignite Alpha's second stage engine to circle its orbit in about 40 minutes. From there, the Lockheed Martin payload should have been deployed. But the company has yet to provide an update four hours later.
The ESA is a type of antenna array that can be controlled electronically. Lockheed says its patented design will allow the company to calibrate ESA's new sensor in a fraction of the time compared to traditional in-orbit sensors, which can take months to power up and be ready to go. The company's ESA demonstrator payload was integrated into a satellite bus built by Terran Orbital (Lockheed owns nearly 7% of Terran's outstanding shares).
While the primary goal of the mission is to deploy the payload, Firefly said its mission team is also tracking total work hours from receiving the payload to preparing for launch, to continue to demonstrate to the Force Spacecraft that is capable of providing rapid launch capabilities. .
Fast launch is a priority for the Space Force; Firefly already demonstrated this once during the last Alpha mission, which set a new launch readiness record. For that mission, Firefly had just 24 hours to complete final launch preparations, encapsulate the payload, and dock it to the rocket.
