Kuiper launch scrubs attributable to {hardware} subject. United Launch Alliance and its buyer, Amazon, must wait longer for the second launch of Amazon’s Venture Kuiper satellites following a scrub on Monday afternoon. “United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 551 carrying Amazon’s second Venture Kuiper mission, Kuiper 2, is delayed attributable to an engineering commentary of an elevated purge temperature throughout the booster engine,” ULA mentioned in an announcement. “The group will consider the {hardware}, and we are going to launch a brand new launch date when out there.”
Again to the VIF in a spiff… On Tuesday, ULA rolled the Atlas V rocket again to its Vertical Integration Facility to handle the difficulty with the nitrogen purge line on the car. Along with this mission, ULA has six extra Atlas 5 rockets which have been bought by Amazon to fly satellites for its constellation. As of Friday morning, ULA had not set a brand new launch date for the Kuiper 2 mission, however it may happen early subsequent week. (submitted by ElllPeaTea)
Varda’s subsequent launch will use in-house spacecraft. Varda House Industries is getting ready to launch its fourth spacecraft, W-4, on a SpaceX rideshare mission scheduled to launch as quickly as June 21 from Vandenberg House Power Base in California, House Information stories. The Los Angeles-based startup manufactures prescribed drugs in orbit and returns them to Earth utilizing specialised reentry capsules.
Not utilizing Rocket Lab… For its first three missions, Varda had partnered with Rocket Lab to make use of its Photon spacecraft for in-space operations. Nonetheless, with W-4, Varda is debuting its first spacecraft constructed solely in-house. The corporate is consolidating design and manufacturing internally in an effort to shorten the timeline between missions and improve flexibility to tailor autos to buyer necessities. Varda determined that vertical integration was important for scaling operations. (submitted by MarkW98)
Vandenberg turns into SpaceX west. One of many defining occasions early within the historical past of SpaceX is when the corporate was successfully booted from Vandenberg House Power Base in 2005 after finishing the primary profitable take a look at firing of the Falcon 1 rocket there. This set the corporate off on an extended romp to Kwajalein Atoll within the Pacific Ocean earlier than buying a launch website at Cape Canaveral, Florida. When SpaceX lastly returned to Vandenberg half a decade later, it had the Falcon 9 rocket and was not the scrappy upstart. Since then, it has made Vandenberg its personal.
