Astra aims to reach orbit for 1st time early Saturday: Watch it live

The launch window opens at midnight EST (0500 GMT) on Saturday

Astra's Rocket 3.2 launches on a test flight from Alaska's Pacific Spaceport Complex on Dec. 15, 2020. The rocket reached space, a first for California-based Astra. (Image credit: Astra/John Kraus)

Update for 2:15 a.m. EST on Nov. 19: Astra has scrubbed its early-Friday (Nov. 19) launch attempt. The next launch window opens at midnight EST (0500 GMT) on Saturday (Nov. 20).

Astra aims to reach orbit for the first time early Friday morning (Nov. 19), and you can watch the action live.

The Bay Area startup plans to send its Launch Vehicle 0007 (LV0007) skyward from the Pacific Spaceport Complex on Alaska's Kodiak Island on Friday during a window that opens at midnight EST (0500 GMT; 8 p.m. local Alaska time on Nov. 18).

Friday's launch is a test mission for the U.S. military. The 43-foot-tall (13 meters) LV0007 will be carrying a dummy payload, just as its predecessor did on Astra's most recent launch.

That liftoff, which occurred from Kodiak on Aug. 28, was a memorable one. The rocket, known as LV0006, performed a horizontal slide off the pad, righted itself a few seconds later and climbed into the Alaska sky. But it couldn't overcome the initial difficulties, and the mission was terminated 2.5 minutes into flight.

Astra soon determined that one of LV0006's five first-stage engines had conked out just after launch, a problem that engineers traced to an issue with the vehicle's propellant-distribution system. That issue has been fixed on LV0007 and other rockets to come, company representatives said.

Astra, which was founded in 2016, intends to secure a large portion of the small-satellite launch market with its line of cost-effective, mass-produced and easily transportable rockets.

The company has conducted three orbital test launches to date, all of them from the Pacific Spaceport Complex. The first flight, which lifted off in September 2020, ended early after Astra's rocket suffered a serious problem with its guidance system.

Astra reached space on the second mission, which launched in December 2020, although the rocket ran out of fuel just before attaining orbital velocity. The third attempt was made by LV006 in August.

Quelle: SC

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Astra delays fourth orbital launch attempt from Kodiak

Smallsat launch startup Astra Space is slated to make another attempt at achieving orbit, now as early as Friday night. The launch window for LV0007 opened on November 18 (November 19 UTC), but a first launch attempt was scrubbed. Launch is now targeted for a backup opportunity no earlier than 9:00 PM PST on November 19 (05:00 UTC on November 20). The launch is to be conducted from LP-3B at the Pacific Spaceport Complex in Kodiak, Alaska.

Similar to the last attempt, the only payload onboard is a test payload for the United States Space Force’s (USSF) Space Test Program which will not be deployed. The USSF designation for the mission is STP-27AD2.

LV0007 is the fourth Rocket 3 vehicle to make an orbital launch attempt. The first-ever Rocket 3 vehicle, more specifically designated Rocket 3.0, was intended to launch on the “1 of 3” mission in pursuit of the DARPA Launch Challenge. Of three companies that entered the challenge – Astra, Virgin Orbit, and Vector Space Systems – Astra was the only company to reach launch day.

On the last launch opportunity to progress in the challenge – March 2, 2020 – the mission was scrubbed, and the challenge went unclaimed. Later that month, while Astra pivoted towards completing a test flight, the vehicle was lost before it could make its launch attempt due to a fire during a pre-launch countdown rehearsal. No payloads or personnel were harmed.

The next vehicle, Rocket 3.1, was the first to fly. In September 2020, the rocket successfully lifted off from Kodiak, but the flight was terminated by range safety due to a guidance issue early in flight.

The next iteration, Rocket 3.2, was successfully able to reach space in December 2020. First stage flight, payload fairing and stage separation, and upper stage ignition all occurred nominally, and the upper stage reached its targeted altitude of 390 kilometers. However, a fuel mixture issue resulted in insufficient horizontal velocity to achieve a stable orbit, and the upper stage destructively reentered Earth’s atmosphere.

This was followed in August 2021 by the first Rocket 3.3 vehicle, designated LV0006. The STP-27AD1 mission, carrying a test payload for the USSF, suffered an engine failure less than a second after liftoff, resulting in insufficient thrust to follow a nominal flight path. While the flight continued for approximately two and a half minutes, the rocket’s trajectory eventually deviated enough to require flight termination. The cause of the failure was identified as a propellant leak from the ground support equipment (GSE).

With fixes implemented, the second Rocket 3.3 vehicle, designated LV0007, is intended to do what LV0006 could not. The launch was preceded by a static fire test, which acted as a countdown and fueling rehearsal and a test of the engines on the first stage. This approximately nine-second-long engine test was successfully completed on November 17.

The test flight itself, again aiming to demonstrate the capability to reach orbit, will begin with ignition of the five first stage engines. The Delphin engines are electrically pumped and fueled by kerosene and liquid oxygen. When propellant depletion occurs on the first stage approximately two minutes and 50 seconds after launch, the five Delphin engines will shut down, followed shortly after by fairing separation at T+2 minutes 55 seconds.

The payload fairing encapsulates both the upper stage and the payload during the atmospheric phase of flight. The vehicle will be flying south from Kodiak toward an 86-degree inclination orbit, targeting an orbital altitude of 500 kilometers.

Following fairing separation, the upper stage will separate at T+3 minutes, and the single Aether engine will ignite three minutes and five seconds after liftoff. Aether is a vacuum optimized engine also fueled by kerosene and liquid oxygen.

The upper stage will burn until about eight and a half minutes after launch, when second engine cutoff, or SECO, will occur, shutting down the Aether engine.

If orbit is achieved successfully, a signal simulating payload deployment will be received by the upper stage at T+8 minutes 40 seconds. No payload will physically separate from the rocket. This will conclude the test flight.

Astra’s future launch manifest includes missions for NASA, the US Space Force, Planet Labs, and Spire Global. However, proceeding into these missions is contingent on a successful orbital test flight – a task now assigned to LV0007.

Lead photo via Brady Kenniston/Astra

NASASpaceflight and Astra are partnering to broadcast the LV0007 test flight. As part of the partnership, Astra is covering some expenses associated with producing the broadcast.

Quelle: NASASpaceflight

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Update: 20.11.2021