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Цитировать2 October 2010 Last updated at 11:30 GMT

Virgin Galactic slows satellite launcher plans[/size]

By Rob Coppinger Spaceflight writer

Virgin Galactic's satellite launching rocket LauncherOne that once attracted $110m in investment is now in doubt.

LauncherOne's manager has departed and the space tourism company's chief executive is talking only about future possibilities for the rocket.

The rocket would take satellites weighing up to 200kg (440lbs) into low-Earth orbit for $1-2m.

LauncherOne was to be air-launched from Virgin Galactic's WhiteKnightTwo aircraft.

This is the same plane that will also launch Sir Richard Branson's tourist carrying SpaceShipTwo spacecraft.

In July 2009, Abu Dhabi-based Aabar Investment offered Virgin Galactic $110m for LauncherOne development, if further studies proved the business case.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/14414.gif)
Launcher 1 (BBC)

Later that year, Sir Richard's Galactic team took on Adam Baker to be its general manager for small satellite launch and to conduct those studies.

Dr Baker had previously worked for Surrey Satellite Technology Limited, the British small spacecraft manufacturer.

The Guildford-based company had been looking to find cheaper and more timely access to space for its clients and had spoken to Virgin Galactic about working on the LauncherOne project in 2008 and early 2009.

But SSTL backed out after attempts to raise some feasibility funding from the then British National Space Centre (now the UK Space Agency) did not succeed.

Soon after Dr Baker's employment started at Galactic, the company's President Will Whitehorn told an October 2009 conference that LauncherOne could start operating a year after the sub-orbital tourism business was up and running.

However, Dr Baker left Virgin Galactic last month and there is no clear explanation from the company as to why the project is not set to follow Mr Whitehorn's timetable.

"It's potentially an exciting area. Galactic as a whole may at some point in the future continue to work beyond looking at future projects," Virgin Galactic's CEO George Whitesides told the BBC. "It's an area we continue to think about."

He rejected the suggestion that the US government's technology export laws had in anyway contributed to the project's lack of progress.

In the meantime, the company continues to test its carrier aircraft ("Eve") and its spacecraft.

Sir Richard told a business conference in Kuala Lumpur last week that Galactic was on track to offer its short hops above the atmosphere for paying passengers within 18 months.

The fares to board the spacecraft SpaceShipTwo ("Enterprise") start at $200,000. The company has already taken deposits from more than 300 hopeful passengers.

ЦитироватьНу вот, собсно, то, о чем так долго говорили большевики :)
Воздушный старт с WK-2.

ЦитироватьLauncherOne: Virgin Galactic's other project[/size]

Jonathan Amos | 14:35 UK time, Tuesday, 10 November 2009

You are going to hear a lot in the next few weeks about Virgin Galactic, not least because on 7 December the company will unveil SpaceShipTwo in the Mojave Desert, California.

This is the rocket plane Sir Richard Branson will use to take fare-paying passengers on sub-orbital flights in the coming years.

In this posting, however, I want to concentrate on another Galactic project which is now gathering pace - the LauncherOne satellite system.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/63214.jpg)
Potential architecture for LauncherOne

Back in January, I reported on early discussions between the Branson outfit and Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) in Guildford.

SSTL is a world leader in the production of low-cost small satellites, and it was keen to explore the possibility of working with Virgin Galactic on a way to get these spacecraft into orbit much more cheaply than is currently possible.

The concept would be somewhat similar to the US Pegasus system, which uses a former airliner to lift a booster to 40,000ft, before releasing it to make its own way into space.

Virgin Galactic's aim is to provide an air-launched system which is faster, cheaper, and more flexible.

It would use SpaceShipTwo's mothership, "Eve", as the launch platform.

Dr Adam Baker, then at SSTL, was hoping for some money from the UK government to do a small feasibility study. The hope was that if things came together, LauncherOne could be a UK-built rocket despatched by Eve running out of a British airport somewhere.

Well, the money wasn't immediately forthcoming and Dr Baker has now moved across to Virgin Galactic to lead its own in-house efforts to give the project momentum.

So where are we? Dr Baker has been in post little more than a month. He's speaking to anyone and everyone, from those who might be interested in helping to build such a launcher to those who might want to use it to put a payload into orbit.

Certainly, there's a compelling need for a cheaper, more flexible launch system for small satellites.

At the moment, companies like SSTL are in a less than satisfactory position.

They often have to wait on the availability of converted Soviet-era missiles, such as Dnepr. This can add months to the timeline of a project.

Sometimes, the launches can get bumped by "more urgent" Russian military payloads, or have to wait while a problem on a satellite co-passenger is resolved (small satellites on a Dnepr are launched in batches).

The issue for LauncherOne, of course, is cost.

At the moment, a small satellite wanting to get into space may have to pay something like $5m-$10m. Virgin Galactic really has to get that down to $1m-$2m for this venture to make financial sense.

And to make that happen, Dr Baker believes the development cost of the rocket to first flight also needs to be kept the right side $100m:

    "The less we can spend developing this, the easier it is going to be to recoup the cost, and the lower the launch price can be.
     
    "Historically, rockets that have been developed from scratch have cost a lot more than $100m. We want to take as much advantage from all the previous 50 years of effort in designing launch vehicles to get the best from the market."

The British imperative is still there. If this vehicle can come out of the UK, so much the better, says Dr Baker. He'd love nothing better than for LauncherOne to be a UK-led initiative. But Virgin will not be overly sentimental about this. It's a business.

Interestingly, feasibility studies have been done in this field before in the UK, including on the possibility of using a Vulcan bomber as the platform for an air-launched satellite service. At least one small assessment has found the economics don't stack up.

Perhaps Virgin Galactic and British industry can show otherwise.

Who'd have thought before Brian Binnie and Mike Melville made their historic flights in SpaceShipOne that trips on a civil spaceliner would soon be possible?

ЦитироватьEXCLUSIVE PICTURES: Virgin Galactic LauncherOne designs revealed

By Rob Coppinger
 on November 5, 2009 3:32 PM

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/77189.jpg)
credit: Virgin Galactic / caption: why the straigth wing and v-tail?

This design for Virgin Galactic's mini satellite launching rocket LauncherOne was shown by the company's small satellite launch general manager Adam Baker at the 60th International Astronautical Congress in Daejeon, Korea in October. For a more colourful LauncherOne design click through to the extended portion of this blog post
launcherone 2.JPG

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/77190.jpg)
credit: Virgin Galactic / caption: This colourful design appears to have a SpaceShipOne like wing and canards. A flyback booster?

Цитировать

ЦитироватьНу вот, собсно, то, о чем так долго говорили большевики :)
Воздушный старт с WK-2.

А Пегас тем временем отдыхает?

ЦитироватьВобщем насколько я понял с суборбитальным туризмом очередное фиаско, стрелки срочно переводятся на наноракету для наноспутников?

Цитировать

ЦитироватьНу вот, собсно, то, о чем так долго говорили большевики :)
Воздушный старт с WK-2.

А Пегас тем временем отдыхает?
 Вобщем насколько я понял с суборбитальным туризмом очередное фиаско, стрелки срочно переводятся на наноракету для наноспутников?

ЦитироватьБоже, у него еще и велосипедное шасси! :)

ЦитироватьТам по-английски написано, что с туризмом все хорошо...

Цитировать

ЦитироватьБоже, у него еще и велосипедное шасси! :)

Фюзеляжей два.

Цитировать

Цитировать

ЦитироватьВоздушный старт с WK-2.

А Пегас тем временем отдыхает?

А что, Пегас - непревзойденный образец дешевизны и эффективности?

ЦитироватьМинотавр и Торус (который не II) его прекрасно заменяют, а самолета для них не надо.
-- Pete

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic launcher delayed[/size]

by Sean McLachlan (RSS feed) on Oct 2nd 2010 at 1:00PM

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:VMS_Eve_Maiden_Flight.jpg)
We've covered space tourism company Virgin Galactic a lot here on Gadling. What hasn't gotten so much discussion is LauncherOne, a rocket that would take off from the WhiteKnightTwo mother ship, the same ship that carries SpaceshipTwo. While SpaceShipTwo is a space plane that would detach from the mother ship and fly into the high atmosphere, LauncherOne is a more conventional rocket that would carry a satellite weighing up to 440 lbs into low orbit.

Originally it was supposed to start sending satellites into space a year after the space tourism business started, but now LauncherOne is in trouble. The manager of the project has left and there's no timetable for getting the system operational. One UK satellite company has backed out of discussions about using LauncherOne.

Virgin owner Sir Richard Branson said the tourism business is still on track and will start sending tourists into the highest reaches of the atmosphere within 18 months at the price of $200,000 a pop. More than three hundred people have already signed up.

What does LauncherOne's troubles mean for space tourism? That's not so clear. While the LauncherOne isn't part of Virgin Galactic's tourism service, it makes the whole program more financially viable. Without the fees charged to satellite owners to use LauncherOne, Virgin Galactic may have to raise its prices or shove in more passengers. Will coach class come to space? Stay tuned.

[Photo courtesy Mark Greenberg and Virgin Galactic]

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/63214.jpg)
Potential architecture for LauncherOne

ЦитироватьВобщем насколько я понял с суборбитальным туризмом очередное фиаско, стрелки срочно переводятся на наноракету для наноспутников?

ЦитироватьРазработка частной ракеты LauncherOne заморожена[/size]

04 октября 2010 года, 12:38 | Текст: Дмитрий Целиков

Так и хочется воскликнуть: «Не верю!» Но увы: будущее частной ракеты-носителя LauncherOne, в которую вложено $110 млн инвестиций, оказалось под вопросом.

Американскую компанию Virgin Galactic покинул руководитель проекта. Владелец потенциального гиганта индустрии космического туризма сэр Ричард Брэнсон тут же стал очень осторожен в своих прогнозах.

Предполагалось, что LauncherOne всего за $1–2 млн сможет выводить на орбиту спутники массой до 200 кг. В свою очередь запускать ракету в воздух должен самолёт WhiteKnightTwo, разрабатываемый той же компанией. Он, как вы помните, будет также поднимать на суборбитальную высоту космический аппарат SpaceShipTwo с туристами, желающими несколько минут побыть в невесомости и полюбоваться красивыми видами.

История LauncherOne началось в июле 2009 года, когда фонд Aabar Investment из Абу-Даби пообещал выделить уже упомянутые $110 млн, если выяснится, что проект будет иметь коммерческий смысл. В конце того же года Ричард Брэнсон нанял в качестве главного конструктора Адама Бейкера из Surrey Satellite Technology Limited, британского производителя маленьких космических аппаратов. Эта фирма планировала заняться разработкой аналогичной ракеты ещё в 2008 году, но не получила финансирования от своего правительства.

Уже в октябре 2009-го президент Virgin Galactic Уилл Уайтхорн заявил, что запуск LauncherOne состоится через год после возникновения рынка суборбитального туризма. На прошлой неделе г-н Брэнсон заявил на конференции в Куала-Лумпур, что первые пассажиры отправятся в космос через каких-то полтора года. О LauncherOne теперь — ни слова. Неизвестными остались и причины ухода г-на Бейкера и фактической заморозки проекта: неужели он был настолько незаменим? Слухи о том, что это как-то связано с законом об экспорте технологий из США (Virgin Group, которой принадлежит Virgin Galactic, — британская корпорация), опровергнуты.

Подготовлено по материалам Би-би-си.

ЦитироватьUK Tycoon Branson Plans To Launch Satellites[/size]
By Reuters

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/66437.jpg)
July 11, 2012

Flamboyant British businessman Richard Branson, whose Virgin empire has encompassed airlines, music stores, mobile phones and condoms, is turning his hand to launching satellites.

The serial entrepreneur and part-time daredevil, who is already working on taking passengers into suborbital space, said on Wednesday the carrier jet for those commercial flights would double up as an aerial platform for launching small satellites.

Fresh from kite surfing across the English Channel, Branson took the stage at the Farnborough Airshow on Wednesday to unveil LauncherOne, a companion satellite-launching business to Virgin Galactic's passenger suborbital spaceflight service.

"I believe this new vehicle will create a long-overdue shakeup of the whole satellite industry, disrupting current norms and limitations in exactly the way SpaceShipTwo has for human space travel and space-based science research," he said.

Virgin Galactic has taken deposits from 529 people for rides on SpaceShipTwo, which cost $200,000.

The six-passenger, two-pilot spaceship, currently undergoing testing, is based on Scaled Composites' prototype SpaceShipOne, which clinched the $10 million Ansari X Prize in 2004 for the first privately-funded human spaceflights.

Branson said he plans to fly with his three children on the first operational SpaceShipTwo flight next year.

Like SpaceShipTwo, LauncherOne will be flown into the air beneath a carrier jet and released. Once separated, the vehicle's rocket engine will fire to carry it into space.

SpaceShipTwo passengers will experience of few minutes of weightlessness and see the curve of Earth set against the blackness of space before returning back through the atmosphere. NASA's first two manned spaceflights in 1961, by Alan Shepard and Virgil "Gus" Grissom, were similar suborbital flights.

LauncherOne, which is designed for cargo only, will be able to put satellites weighing up to 500 pounds into orbit for less than $10 million.

Virgin Galactic president George Whitesides said four companies, including Planetary Resources, a newly unveiled venture to build and fly privately-funded space telescopes, have put down deposits for LauncherOne flights.

Initially, both SpaceShipTwo and LauncherOne missions will be staged from Spaceport America, a new commercial spaceport in New Mexico.

Virgin Galactic's initial fleet includes five spaceships and three White Knight carrier aircraft.

LauncherOne, a two-stage liquid-fueled rocket being developed by The Spaceship Company (TSC) of Mojave, Calif., is expected to debut in 2016. TSC is a partnership of Virgin Galactic and Mojave, Calif.-based Scaled Composites, a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman.[/size]

ЦитироватьVirgin Reveals LauncherOne Plan[/size]
By Guy Norris guy_norris@aviationweek.com
Source: AWIN First

July 11, 2012

Virgin Galactic has officially unveiled a low-cost, small satellite launch system that builds on elements of its space tourism development.

The LauncherOne system will deliver payloads up to 500 lb. to low Earth orbit, and with a target price of under $10 million per launch, is aimed at dramatically cutting the cost of launching small satellites.

Backed by Virgin Galactic's partner Aabar Investments, the development of the "new vehicle will create a long-awaited shake-up of the satellite launch industry," Virgin founder Richard Branson says.

The system is based on a 30,000-lb.-class, winged vehicle that will be carried to around 50,000 ft. for air launch by the WhiteKnightTwo mother ship developed as the carrier aircraft for the SpaceShipTwo (SS2) suborbital vehicle.

LauncherOne will be powered by a two-stage, liquid-fueled rocket, now in initial development by Virgin Galactic. The same rocket also is intended to ultimately replace the non-reusable RM2 hybrid motor that will power the SS2 to suborbit, Virgin says.

The RM2 is in the final stages of development by Sierra Nevada Space Systems and "all major components have now been qualified for powered flight," according to Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides. The RM2 is the major pacing item to the start of rocket-powered flight tests of SS2, which are expected to start by year's end. Assuming tests go as planned, Virgin hopes to start initial suborbital passenger flights by the end of 2013.

Initial LauncherOne flights are due to start in 2015, with commercial flights getting under way by 2016. The development will run closely in parallel with Virgin Galactic's recently awarded Airborne Launch Assist Space Access (Alasa) program, a U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) initiative to design air-launch systems that can orbit payloads below 100 lb. for $1 million, including range costs.

Virgin is one of three winners of the initial Alasa contract, along with Boeing and Lockheed Martin. This $46 million, 18-month first phase runs through September 2013, when Darpa plans another competition to select at least one team to conduct up to 36 launches in 2015.

Initial customers for the LauncherOne include Skybox Imaging, a California-based developer of a high-resolution imaging constellation, and GeoOptics, which is working on non-imaging remote sensing systems. Others are smallsat aggregator Spaceflight, and Planetary Resources, the recently launched asteroid mining venture.[/size]

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic takes on satellite launch market[/size]
BY STEPHEN CLARK
SPACEFLIGHT NOW
Posted: July 11, 2012

FARNBOROUGH, England -- Virgin Galactic announced Wednesday it is offering commercial launch services for small satellites with an air-launched rocket named LauncherOne, and four companies have placed deposits as future customers.

The LauncherOne concept builds upon Virgin Galactic's space tourism architecture. A two-stage rocket would take off underneath the company's WhiteKnightTwo carrier airplane, which would drop LauncherOne before ignition to accelerate into orbit.

Virgin Galactic unveiled the initiative here at the Farnborough International Airshow.

LauncherOne would be able to place up to 500 pounds of payload into low Earth orbit, and Richard Branson, founder of Virgin, said its first flight would occur by 2016. The price of a LauncherOne mission would be less than $10 million, according to Virgin Galactic.

"Virgin Galactic's goal is to revolutionize the way we get to space," Branson said. "I'm immensely proud of what we have already achieved as we draw near to regular suborbital flights on SpaceShipTwo. Now, LauncherOne is bringing the price of satellite launch into the realm of affordability for innovators everywhere, from start-ups and schools to established companies and national space agencies. It will be a critical new tool for the global research community, enabling us all to learn about our home planet more quickly and affordably."

Private funding from aabar Investments PJS of Abu Dhabi is already going toward LauncherOne development.

WhiteKnightTwo was built to haul Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo suborbital space plane to an altitude of up to 50,000 feet. SpaceShipTwo's own hybrid rocket motor will fire to propel the craft over 62 miles high, the internationally-recognized boundary between the atmosphere and space.

According to Branson, Virgin Galactic has booked deposits from 529 SpaceShipTwo passengers. SpaceShipTwo is currently in a test campaign demonstrating its ability to glide back to a runway landing following a mission.

The first rocket-powered SpaceShipTwo test flight is expected to occur before the end of 2012, according to Virgin Galactic.

George Whitesides, Virgin Galactic's CEO, highlighted the plight of small businesses, universities and space agencies with lightweight satellite programs. Few low-cost launchers exist to match the tight budgets of many small satellite owners.

"Small satellite launch is an area ripe for disruption," Whitesides said. "Miniaturized satellite components and constrained budgets are driving commercial clients, academic users and government agencies all to clamor for an affordable, dedicated launch vehicle. Now, thanks to aabar's investment, our existing capabilities, and the expert team we’ve already assembled, we're prepared to fill that void by bringing LauncherOne to market."

Virgin Galactic officials said LauncherOne could be based from a number of sites, although missions will at first be limited to U.S. bases. A company promotional video demonstrated the wide variety of orbits LauncherOne could reach from launch ranges including Cape Canaveral, Fla., Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., and sites in Virginia and Alaska.

Stratolaunch Systems in December unveiled plans to mount a heavier rocket developed by SpaceX underneath a massive carrier airplane. The Stratolaunch concept is tailored for larger payloads than LauncherOne.

Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Pegasus rocket is dropped from beneath an L-1011 carrier airplane. The solid-fueled Pegasus launcher can deliver more than 1,000 pounds to low Earth orbit and has flown 41 times.

Planetary Resources Inc., a U.S.-based firm promising to launch mining expeditions to near-Earth asteroids, said Wednesday it has an agreement with Virgin Galactic to enable the launch of multiple commercial space telescopes aboard LauncherOne.

The constellation of Arkyd 100 telescopes will fly in low Earth orbit to study nearby asteroids, gauging which objects merit a visit based on the economic value of their metals and the propulsive energy needed to reach them.

California-based Skybox Imaging, which has raised $91 million to launch at least two Earth imaging microsatellites, was also named as a LauncherOne customer. GeoOptics Inc. of Pasadena, Calif., will use LauncherOne to help loft a constellation of environmental monitoring satellites.

Spaceflight Inc. of Seattle also has an agreement with LauncherOne. Spaceflight is dedicated to supporting access to space for small satellite and manifests secondary payloads on other launch vehicles.

The U.S. subsidiary of Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. and Sierra Nevada Corp., both builders of small satellites, will develop spacecraft platforms optimized for the LauncherOne vehicle, according to Virgin Galactic. [/size]

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/66441.jpg)
ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP/Getty Images
Virgin Galactic's Richard Branson shows a model of Launcher One, an air-launched rocket. It is specifically designed
to deliver small satellites into orbit. Commercial flights of the new orbital launch vehicle are expected to begin by 2016.

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic решила запускать спутники с самолета
[/size]
16.07.12, Пн, 09:38, Мск

Компания Virgin Galactic представила технологию запуска малых спутников, которая существенно удешевит вывод космических аппаратов на орбиту.

Система запуска под названием LauncherOne представляет собой самолет-носитель WhiteKnight, к которому подвешивается не суборбитальный самолет SpaceShipTwo, а небольшая двухступенчатая ракета-носитель со спутником.

Двигатель ракеты работает на жидком кислороде и керосине, ракета может вывести на низкую околоземную орбиту до 225 кг полезной нагрузки (100 кг на солнечно-синхронную орбиту) за менее чем 10 млн долл. Это в 3-4 раза дешевле существующих способов вывода грузов в космос. Максимально допустимый объем полезной нагрузки достаточно велик для ракет-носителей этого класса. Обтекатель ракеты имеет диаметр около 1 м, причем длина цилиндрической части составит 77 см, далее идет конический обтекатель.

Компоненты LauncherOne будут собраны на заводе в Калифорнии. Испытательные полеты начнутся с 2015 года, а коммерческие - с 2016 года. Глава компании Virgin Galactic Ричард Брэнсон отметил, что заказы на запуски уже есть, несмотря на фактическое отсутствие ракеты-носителя и успешного завершения испытаний.

Отметим, что интерес к системе LauncherOne озвучила, например, компания Skybox Imaging, которая занимается продажей недорогих спутниковых снимков и других данных космического мониторинга. В свою очередь, производители спутников компании Surrey Satellite Technology и Sierra Nevada Space Systems заявили, что намерены разработать специальные космические аппараты, оптимизированные для использования с системой LauncherOne.

http://youtu.be/xAdV9fqllRk[/size]

ЦитироватьSpaceflight Inc. to Fly Payloads on Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne[/size]
Posted by Doug Messier
on July 20, 2012, at 2:50 am

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/26041.jpg)

Seattle, WA,  19 July 2012 (Spaceflight PR) –  Spaceflight Inc. (Spaceflight) announced today that it has signed an agreement with Virgin Galactic for dedicated flights on the LauncherOne vehicle recently revealed at the Farnborough Air Show.

Spaceflight Inc. was established to revolutionize secondary payload flight services for fixed and deployable cargo and transport.  Under the agreement with Virgin Galactic, Spaceflight will integrate and launch small spacecraft using the LauncherOne vehicle. Previously, secondary payloads have been limited to orbit insertion dictated by the primary payload, now secondary payloads can go to an orbit optimized for their specific mission.

"This is an exciting new launch capability added to our service offering," said Jason Andrews, President and CEO of Spaceflight. "With the LauncherOne vehicle Spaceflight offers expanded launch flexibility and opportunities to meet our customer's mission requirements, all at a commercial space price."

"We designed LauncherOne to open space up to innovators looking for affordable launches for small satellites," said Steve Isakowitz, Chief Technology Officer and Executive Vice President of Virgin Galactic. "Spaceflight, Inc has great experience helping those kinds of spacecraft get into space as secondary payloads, and now, will be able to offer a much more flexible dedicated platform. We are very excited to work with Spaceflight, and this agreement paves the way for one critical path for even the smallest of payloads to get a ride to space."

Spaceflight's model allows payloads to be rapidly manifested, certified, integrated and flown to space by providing a single one-stop shop that manifests and integrates payloads for a range of emerging launch and space transportation vehicles, maximizing flight opportunities, and at published commercial pricing.  This simplifies the integration planning by serving as a single point of contact for the customer while coordinating the specifics of launch opportunities.  Spaceflight has launch contracts to fly secondary payloads on the Orbital Antares, SpaceX Falcon 9, and Russian Soyuz and Dnepr launch vehicles.  

About Spaceflight, Inc.

Spaceflight Inc. was established in 2009 by Jason Andrews, President and CEO of Andrews Space, to revolutionize secondary payload flight services for fixed and deployable cargo and transport.  More information about Spaceflight and specific flight opportunities can be found on the company's website: www.spaceflightservices.com[/size]

ЦитироватьВобщем с ЫЫЕ обломилось, переходят на обычные ракеты.

ЦитироватьА с чего вы решили, что вообще что-то будет, кроме рисунков и красивых фотографий бородатого миллионера?

1. 10 млн долл за 100 кил на ССО  :?: Со 100-килграммовой ПН однозначно в попутчики дешевле набиться.

2. Жидкостная с ЖК РН  :?:  - Воздушный старт №2

ЦитироватьГлавное, что SSTwo (ЫЫЕ) уже есть, и непонятно, почему Старый считает, что с ним все обломалось? :roll:

Цитировать

ЦитироватьГлавное, что SSTwo (ЫЫЕ) уже есть, и непонятно, почему Старый считает, что с ним все обломалось? :roll:

Ни одного полета на ракетном моторе еще не было. Максимум пока - планирующие сбросы и испытания мотора на стенде-аналоге в Мохаве. В любой момент всю программу могут закрыть.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьГлавное, что SSTwo (ЫЫЕ) уже есть, и непонятно, почему Старый считает, что с ним все обломалось? :roll:

Ни одного полета на ракетном моторе еще не было. Максимум пока - планирующие сбросы и испытания мотора на стенде-аналоге в Мохаве. В любой момент всю программу могут закрыть.

ЦитироватьДа, хрен с ней с ракетой (хотя Вёрджин Галактик и является одним из финалистов конкурса DARPA на малый носитель воздушного старта). Главное, что SSTwo (ЫЫЕ) уже есть, и непонятно, почему Старый считает, что с ним все обломалось? :roll:

Цитировать

ЦитироватьДа, хрен с ней с ракетой (хотя Вёрджин Галактик и является одним из финалистов конкурса DARPA на малый носитель воздушного старта). Главное, что SSTwo (ЫЫЕ) уже есть, и непонятно, почему Старый считает, что с ним все обломалось? :roll:

Както очень уж вовремя и громко вынырнула эта ракета. Похоже на перевод стрелок.
 А с ЫЫЕ както всё тихо. Дата отхода поезда купившим билеты не сообщается...

ЦитироватьТо есть, арабские инвесторы, вложившие несколько сот миллионов, сочтут, что лучше списать эти деньги, чем вложить ещё?

Цитировать

ЦитироватьТо есть, арабские инвесторы, вложившие несколько сот миллионов, сочтут, что лучше списать эти деньги, чем вложить ещё?

а зачем "вложить еще"? Чтобы еще больше сжечь в этой топке?

ЦитироватьО какой топке речь, непонятно. VG не топка, а нормальная современная аэрокосмическая компания.

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ЦитироватьО какой топке речь, непонятно. VG не топка, а нормальная современная аэрокосмическая компания.

Каждый год задержки - это берем зарплату всех сотрудников и складываем, результат идет в дебит проекта. WK1/SS1 сварганили за два года, и было это в 2003-м. Сейчас уже 9 лет прошло, ну и где результат? Рано или поздно задержки сожгут весь капитал. Это вам не Ангара, где госфинансирование не имеет конца: дадут сколько надо. Здесь не дадут.

ЦитироватьО какой топке речь, непонятно. VG не топка, а нормальная современная аэрокосмическая компания.

ЦитироватьЗдесь, например, задержка, связанная с катастрофой при взрыве закиси. Здесь требования не "рекордного прыжка за призом", а коммерческой системы, с другими требованиями безопасности. Ну и размеры системы другие.

ЦитироватьБезусловно, решать, дать или нет, будут инвесторы. Однако странно было бы дойти до полётов СС2 без мотора - и прекратить, в общем-то, технически разумный проект, особенно на фоне наличия некоторых успехов у конкурентов из XCOR.

ЦитироватьИнвесторы часто больше боятся не потерять фиксированную сумму денег, а не получить гораздо большую.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьО какой топке речь, непонятно. VG не топка, а нормальная современная аэрокосмическая компания.

А мне почемуто кажется что топка. И инвесторы не вернут своих денег.

ЦитироватьБолее 500 человек внесли деньги на депозит, забрали обратно - единицы. Непреодолимых технических трудностей нет. Так что говорить о том, что дело "обломалось" - как минимум, преждевременно. Вот если они лет через 5 не отобьют вложения, тогда да.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьО какой топке речь, непонятно. VG не топка, а нормальная современная аэрокосмическая компания.

А мне почемуто кажется что топка. И инвесторы не вернут своих денег.

ЦитироватьИ напротив, я слишком вблизи их видел, поэтому трудно удержаться от оптимизма.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьЗдесь, например, задержка, связанная с катастрофой при взрыве закиси. Здесь требования не "рекордного прыжка за призом", а коммерческой системы, с другими требованиями безопасности. Ну и размеры системы другие.

И что из этого? Деньги то расходуются а доходов нет.

ЦитироватьПричины по которым нет доходов никак не отменяют убыточность предприятия.

ЦитироватьКстати, не били ли себя авторы проекта пяткой в грудь что закись азота безопасна, поэтому её и выбрали?

ЦитироватьИ в таких изобретателей ктото вложит ещё инвестиции?

Цитировать

ЦитироватьБезусловно, решать, дать или нет, будут инвесторы. Однако странно было бы дойти до полётов СС2 без мотора - и прекратить, в общем-то, технически разумный проект, особенно на фоне наличия некоторых успехов у конкурентов из XCOR.

Ничего удивительного. Огромное количество проектов обанкротилось на этой стадии.

ЦитироватьА многие и на куда более поздней стадии, уже в процессе полётов, те же Иридиум, Орбкомм и другие.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьИнвесторы часто больше боятся не потерять фиксированную сумму денег, а не получить гораздо большую.

И сильно это помогло инвесторам Иридиума?

ЦитироватьИнвесторы чего - слепые котята?

ЦитироватьОни что, не видят что их деньги пожираются а доходов как не было так и нет

Цитироватьи не видно даже на горизонте?

ЦитироватьИ будут тупо давать всё новые и новые деньги

Цитироватьиз страха чего говоришь? Чего они бояться? Потерять слишком мало денег?

Цитировать

ЦитироватьБолее 500 человек внесли деньги на депозит, забрали обратно - единицы. Непреодолимых технических трудностей нет. Так что говорить о том, что дело "обломалось" - как минимум, преждевременно. Вот если они лет через 5 не отобьют вложения, тогда да.

Видел я рекламные ролики с участием этих 500 человек. Классические Лёни Голубковы.
 Я и не говорю что дело обломилось. Я говорю что создаётся такое впечатление, возможно обманчивое.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьИ напротив, я слишком вблизи их видел, поэтому трудно удержаться от оптимизма.

К ним не стоит подходить близко. Заражают оптимизмом, причем совершенно конкретным, своим. Работа такая потому что.

ЦитироватьОбычное дело. Проект не закончен, продавать нечего - поэтому доходов и мало. Бывает, выкручиваются - НПОЭ, проигрывая Луну, занялась ОС, XCOR или, там, Армадилло делают заказы... VG фокусируется на своём крупном продукте. Так тоже бывает.

ЦитироватьУбыточность планируемая - на этом этапе.

ЦитироватьА чем плохо заражаться оптимизмом? :)

ЦитироватьМне не очень понятно - мне кажется, мы на этом форуме достаточно хорошо понимаем техническую возможность таких полётов. Мало того, есть прототип. Проблемы в деталях, а не в принципе.

ЦитироватьИ более того, уже летает - хотя и без мотора - и ВК2, и СС2. По-моему, экватор пройден. Неужели так много поводов для сомнений?

Цитировать

ЦитироватьА чем плохо заражаться оптимизмом? :)

Тому кто гребёт на этом деньги - отлично. Тому кто ему свои деньги отдаёт безвозвратно - ничего хорошего.
 Я так понимаю раскрутить на бабки ему удалось арабских шейхов - крупных специалистов по космонавтике? Своих специалистов уговорить не удалось?

ЦитироватьКроме своих денег и арабских он привлек деньги частных лиц, которые вносят на депозит авансовый платеж за билет. Вряд ли эти деньги лежат мертвым грузом.

ЦитироватьДа, я уже отмечал - Лёней Голубковых.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьДа, я уже отмечал - Лёней Голубковых.

Среди них Берт Рутан, Ричард Брэнсон и члены их семей :lol:

Цитировать

ЦитироватьОбычное дело. Проект не закончен, продавать нечего - поэтому доходов и мало. Бывает, выкручиваются - НПОЭ, проигрывая Луну, занялась ОС, XCOR или, там, Армадилло делают заказы... VG фокусируется на своём крупном продукте. Так тоже бывает.

Да. Обычное дело. Именно так банкротится любое предприятие.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьУбыточность планируемая - на этом этапе.

Да ну? Подними планы - когда они планировали начать полёты и получать прибыль? В том то и дело что на этом этапе планировали не только окупаемость но и прибыли а их нет и конца убыткам не видно.

ЦитироватьДальнейшее бла-бла-бла скипаю.
 Потому как именно так и банкротятся стартапы. Никогда стартапщик не говорит что дело швах и инвесторы не получат своих денег. Всегда у него всё прекрасно, всё на мази, трудности временые, перспективы блестящи, вот-вот пойдут прибыли и инвесторам надо только ещё чуть-чуть потерпеть а ещё лучше вложить ещё немного денег в новый прожект этого же стартапщика.

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Цитировать

ЦитироватьДа, я уже отмечал - Лёней Голубковых.

Среди них Берт Рутан, Ричард Брэнсон и члены их семей :lol:

:) :) :)
 И тоже положили деньги на депозит? :)

ЦитироватьА что, время этих ребят ничего не стоит, что ли? Им делать нечего?
Или, по-твоему, время - это не деньги? :)

Цитировать

ЦитироватьМне не очень понятно - мне кажется, мы на этом форуме достаточно хорошо понимаем техническую возможность таких полётов. Мало того, есть прототип. Проблемы в деталях, а не в принципе.

Отнюдь. Прооблема принципиальна. Проблема в том что это не технический а коммерческий проект. И будет ли он приносить прибыль - вот главная проблема. Если он будет убыточен то он обанкротится независимо от наличия/отсутствия технических проблем.

Цитировать

ЦитироватьИ более того, уже летает - хотя и без мотора - и ВК2, и СС2. По-моему, экватор пройден. Неужели так много поводов для сомнений?

Они летают в несколько раз позже чем было обещано.

ЦитироватьЭто плохой симтом.

ЦитироватьЛибо Брэнсон такой лох что умудрился в разы ошибиться со сроками

Цитироватьлибо озвучивая сроки он сознательно врал с целью обмануть инвесторов. Какой вариант тебе больше нравится?

ЦитироватьСаня, ты вроде живёшь в условиях рыночной экономики. Почему ты говоришь только о технической стороне? Такия понятия как "прибыль", "убытки", "банкротство" тебе незнакомы?

ЦитироватьИридиум был совершенно реален технически однако это не помешало ему обанкротиться. Инвесторы потеряли свои деньги не получив взамен ни шиша. Орбкомм успел обанкротиться несколько раз. То же с многими другими космическими коммерческими проектами.

ЦитироватьТак что техническая реализуемость никак не отменяет убыточность и банкротство. Это так трудно понять?

ЦитироватьВерно. Но есть ли сейчас уверенные свидетельства того, что проект будет коммерчески неудачным?

ЦитироватьСейчас, по прошествии 8 лет, многие неопределённости сняты.

ЦитироватьВсей этой информации не было в 2004 - и приходилось закладываться на неопределённости, это был риск - который теперь гораздо ниже.

ЦитироватьТеперь, рынок. Делся ли рынок куда-то?

Цитироватьа богатые тем временем богатеют, и соответственно, могут себе позволить суборбитальный туризм.

ЦитироватьАргумент, конечно, дурацкий, но - резкого падения спроса на билеты тоже нет. Можно ли говорить, что рынок стал сильно хуже? Я не вижу существенных новых аргументов, из тех, которых не было в 2004.

Цитировать"В несколько раз позже" - это какая-то странная мера. Обычно проекты такого рода оценивают опозданиями на сколько-то.

ЦитироватьИ то - они обещали изначально в 2006 разве полететь? Не в 2008?

ЦитироватьПлан, конечно, предъявляли - но ведь понятно, что если, скажем, государство завинтит законы, или вступит в трудную войну, или будет серьёзная депрессия - которой в Штатах, особенно в аэрокосмосе "новых частников", сейчас не так чтобы очень - или вон авария типа взрыва закиси - то сроки двинутся.

ЦитироватьВообще в аэрокосмосе это редко когда исключение, а не правило... Вопрос, насколько.

ЦитироватьОснователи и инвесторы, конечно, ошибаются. Если не ошибаются - часто это значит, что задача недостаточно серьёзная поставлена. Сразу называть лохом - вот это как раз не очень серьёзно выглядит. См. выше.

ЦитироватьИнвесторов сложно обмануть, как уже рассказывал.

ЦитироватьВот и вопрос инвесторам - не верить своим глазам и списать расходы - или подтвердить, что в аэрокосмосе результаты бывают, хотя часто с опозданием.

ЦитироватьМожно ли расчёт прибыльности "на пальцах" провести? 200 тысяч долларов за билет - миллион для шести пассажиров за полёт. XCOR собирается 4 раза в день летать, 250 дней в году - тысяча полётов в год;

Цитироватьпусть VG 300 полётов. Полторы тысячи пассажиров за год, 300 миллионов.

Цитироватьвопрос скорее в том, найдутся ли желающие в достаточном количестве (заметь, у меня никаких данных по рынку нет).

ЦитироватьМожет, и нет - но резервы снижения цены явно есть,

Цитироватьа кроме того, есть дополнительные виды услуг - наука, микроспутники.

ЦитироватьНа пальцах - не видно явного несхождения затрат-прибылей.

ЦитироватьА вот связь через геостационар прибыльна.

ЦитироватьИли, скажем, продажа картинок с орбиты,

Цитироватьили спутниковое радио.

ЦитироватьТо есть, имеются и положительные примеры.

ЦитироватьЗаранее трудно сказать. Иридиуму неповезло - возник технический соперник, сотовая связь.

ЦитироватьКакого соперника ты ждёшь для VG? Для этой суборбитальной отрасли в целом?

ЦитироватьДа понятно, что не отменяет. Но пуст ли наполовину стакан, или полон? Особенно когда в него непрерывно наливают и отпивают?

ЦитироватьПо моему, аналогий у нас не хватает.

ЦитироватьЯ признаю, что не могу доказать - именно доказать - однозначность успешности VG. Но примеры неудач тоже не показывают, что и тут это неизбежно - условия разные.

ЦитироватьЯ говорю лишь о том что появляются некотрые признаки краха. Не обязательно они закончатся крахом.

ЦитироватьОни, Володь, почти всегда есть... даже в самом начале.  

ЦитироватьИнвестиции - дело рисковое. Иридиум всё же существует - можно было бы пытаться отыграть часть потерь за годы. Многие инвесторы решили не связываться. Тем не менее сейчас Иридиум как-то поддерживается.

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ЦитироватьИнвестиции - дело рисковое. Иридиум всё же существует - можно было бы пытаться отыграть часть потерь за годы. Многие инвесторы решили не связываться. Тем не менее сейчас Иридиум как-то поддерживается.

Этот аргумент не годится, ибо их спасло гос-во, в виде военных анлимов для группировок в Ираке/Афгане. Это вообще американская специфика, что военные загребают большую долю пусковых услуг и косм. связи и тем поддерживают иначе убыточные проекты.
Что бы определить коммерческую составляющую надо смотреть на инвестиции в эти проекты из других не столь милитаризированных стран. А то, ещё по Китаю\Индии тенденции мерить придется. ;)

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ЦитироватьОни, Володь, почти всегда есть... даже в самом начале.  

Нет, не было их в самом начале. Точнее был но один - торговля "билетами в космос" среди Лёней Голубковых. А теперь появляются новые признаки.

ЦитироватьИх государство один раз спасло или всё время спасает?

Государству тоже иногда нужны услуги - даже по высоким ценам, если иначе услуги не получить. С точки зрения Штатов это несколько больше "поддержание индустрии", чем "кормление неудачников деньгами налогоплательщиков". Поддержание индустрии, конечно, должно заканчиваться - но вроде бы частники демонстрируют растущие возможности. Вон уже НАСА может себе позволить не строить пилотируемые корабли.

ЦитироватьТо что я предлагал для "Воздушного старта" пару лет тому назад, на базе 2-х Русланов с 6-ю криогенными ВРД.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/26209.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/26210.png)

ЦитироватьКошмар! Самолет на орбите!

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ЦитироватьКошмар! Самолет на орбите!

Ракетоноситель.  :D

ЦитироватьТо что я предлагал для "Воздушного старта" пару лет тому назад, на базе 2-х Русланов с 6-ю криогенными ВРД.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/26209.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/26210.png)

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic Opens LauncherOne Facility in Long Beach
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — February 12, 2015
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155414.jpg)
Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne. Credit: Virgin Galactic  
 
WASHINGTON — Virgin Galactic announced Feb. 12 that the company is opening a new facility in Long Beach, California, devoted to development of its small satellite launch vehicle.
Virgin Galactic said that it is leasing a 13,900-square-meter building at the Long Beach Airport that it will use for the design and manufacturing of LauncherOne. The company did not disclose the terms of the lease.
"The technical progress our team has made designing and testing LauncherOne has enabled a move into a dedicated facility to produce the rocket at quantity," Virgin Galactic chief executive George Whitesides said in a statement announcing the new facility. LauncherOne work has been based to date in Mojave, California.
LauncherOne is an air-launch system for satellites weighing up to 225 kilograms. The system will use the same aircraft, WhiteKnightTwo, as the company's SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle, but replaces SpaceShipTwo with a two-stage launch vehicle using engines fueled by liquid oxygen and kerosene.
At the Federal Aviation Administration Commercial Space Transportation Conference Feb. 4, William Pomerantz, vice president of special projects for Virgin Galactic, said the company has already tested engines and other "core infrastructure" of LauncherOne. "We are a fairly vertically-integrated team," he said. "We really do control a lot of the production in house."
Pomerantz said that about 60 of the 450 employees of Virgin Galactic and its wholly-owned subsidiary, The Spaceship Company, are currently dedicated to the LauncherOne program.
Virgin Galactic said it will hold a job fair at its new Long Beach facility March 7, but did not disclose how many people it plans to hire there. The Virgin Galactic website lists approximately 20 job opening related to the LauncherOne program as of Feb. 12.
When Virgin Galactic announced the LauncherOne program in 2012, it said it had signed up several companies as initial customers, including Planetary Resources, GeoOptics, Spaceflight Inc., and Skybox Imaging, since acquired by Google.
In January, the Virgin Group announced it was investing in OneWeb, a venture that plans a constellation of nearly 650 satellites in low Earth orbit to provide broadband communications, with at least some of those satellites to be launched by LauncherOne.

ЦитироватьQ&A | Will Pomerantz, Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne Point Man
by Leonard David (http://spacenews.com/author/leonard-david/) — February 17, 2015
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155420.jpg)
William Pomerantz, once a self-admitted skeptic of the small-satellite market, has been charged with bringing Virgin Galactic headlong into it. Credit: Virgin Galactic
Profile | Will Pomerantz
 Vice President, Special Projects, Virgin Galactic

A New Day for Smallsat Launchers?
As if trying to establish the world's first suborbital space tourism business weren't enough of a technical and market challenge, Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic venture also wants to get in the game of launching small satellites.
The tourism side naturally commands the most attention — that was the case even before last year's fatal crash of Virgin's SpaceShipTwo rocketship (http://spacenews.com/42391spaceshiptwo-destroyed-in-fatal-test-flight-accident/) during a test flight. But the company, whose backers include Aabar Investments of the United Arab Emirates, also has been plugging away quietly on a dedicated air-launched rocket that would deliver small satellites to low Earth orbit for $10 million or less.
LauncherOne is a two-stage expendable rocket powered by liquid-oxygen/kerosene engines. It would be carried aloft by the same WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft that takes SpaceShipTwo to its launching altitude and released at an altitude of 13,500 to 15,000 meters.
Recent history is littered with failed attempts to develop commercially focused small-satellite launchers, not only because of the technical challenges and investment required but also because past projections of market demand haven't quite panned out. Yet today Virgin Galactic is one of several entrepreneurial companies having a go at this very same market, which has been re-energized in recent years by advances in small-satellite technology and a flood of investment capital, much of it from technology hotbeds like Silicon Valley.
Branson is doing his part on that front. The serial entrepreneur's Virgin Group is making an unspecified, but presumably large, investment in OneWeb (http://spacenews.com/virgin-qualcomm-invest-in-global-satellite-internet-plan/), which plans to deploy a 650-satellite constellation to deliver Internet connectivity to the underserved masses. Chipmaker Qualcomm is also investing, despite the fact that these broadband mega-constellations have their own unhappy history.
Will Pomerantz, Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne point man, admits to having come to the business with some skepticism. But he now counts himself squarely among the ranks of those who say, in effect, that this time it's different.
 Pomerantz spoke recently with veteran SpaceNews correspondent Leonard David just before Virgin Galactic announced plans to establish a LauncherOne manufacturing facility in Los Angeles.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155413.jpg)
Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne spacecraft shown in low Earth orbit after payload separation. Credit: Virgin Galactic

How would you describe your job at Virgin Galactic?
 It has been four years that I've been working with Virgin Galactic, so it's a little bit of everything now. Broadly speaking, it means for a startup I help out wherever we need help. I've done everything from helping to start up the flying of research payloads on our suborbital SpaceShipTwo to helping start up our new satellite launch vehicle, the LauncherOne.

Given all the failed attempts over the years to develop commercial small-satellite launchers, what drove Virgin Galactic to try and enter this market?
 I must admit that I started out somewhat skeptical about the small-satellite market when I first got tasked to look at it. A lot of very smart people have tried their hand at it and haven't had the success that they might desire. My big question when we started looking at it internally was, "What's different now and what makes us different?"

And?
 The time is quite different now and the time is really ripe for this. We've got some special things that I think give us a unique flavor that will allow us to address this market. In terms of timing, particularly in the last month or so — but even more broadly over the last couple of years — there is a huge amount of global interest in smallsats. It's not only from technology players but also from some of the really savvy investment and business players. When I say small satellites, I mean 500 pounds (225 kilograms) or less. What we saw were a lot of companies springing up and doing technology demonstrations, usually using ride shares. That's a great way for them to get their technology in space and to show their staff and investors that, yes, it works. But it's not a great way to scale up a business plan.

Is there enough of a market out there to close a business case?
 For the moment we've focused our efforts on engaging just with the U.S.-based commercial community and particularly with constellation customers. Those are customers that are not just looking for a one-off launch but for a routine cadence of launches. A lot of the initial interest in this did come from Aabar Investments. That was one of the items that they were most excited about. That region of the world is one that has been looking at smaller satellites. The United Arab Emirates has flown a couple of smaller satellites and is starting to build an in-country capacity to build them. Aabar has been plugged into that community for a while and recognized it as a growing business.

When would LauncherOne be ready for business?
 For LauncherOne we're aiming to have initial flights to orbit in the later part of 2016, so relatively soon now. We start to ramp up into regular and routine commercial service immediately thereafter. We have been making a lot of progress in our facilities in Southern California. There's been a lot of advanced hardware testing of the engines and tankage, avionics, and tests of structures. We will certainly have test flights, but I think that we will have commercial customers even on the test flights. The contractual structures for those will be reflective of the fact that it is an unproven vehicle and doesn't have a long track record until you've got a few under your belt.

For a user of LauncherOne, what's the cost?
 We have committed to a price that is below $10 million. The $10 million covers a single full launch of LauncherOne. Some of our customers will carry only one satellite per launch, others will carry a large number. What we're working now is how far below that $10 million can we get. Our market is very price sensitive. So the lower we can turn that dial the more business we can get. Not only the more launches we get for each one of our customers, but the more new customers that all of a sudden can play in this field.

Would LauncherOne operate out of just one site?
 No. We're going to make the most out of the benefit of being an air-launched system. WhiteKnightTwo, from a technical level, is capable of going almost everywhere. So in the near-term, we're looking at various options on both the East and West coasts of the continental United States. Initially we will likely be operating with a single WhiteKnightTwo but it's always been the intention to have a fleet of WhiteKnightTwos. Ultimately, we want to be able to fly from a lot of different locations.

Who is building LauncherOne?
 It is essentially being built all in-house. We have more than 50 people now dedicated to the program. We are developer of the rocket, the engines, tanks — it really is us. By the way, we're on the lookout for senior people in the field as well as the fresh outs that are looking to transfer to a new industry. We are aggressively out there looking for the best and brightest, for people who have shown they care about what things cost, not just how they work.

How much has been invested in LauncherOne?
 It's been a pretty significant amount of money put in by the Virgin Group and it shows a serious commitment to seeing this project through to fruition.

What does the mid-January announcement by OneWeb of plans to deploy a large constellation of low-orbiting satellites to provide high-speed Internet to underserved areas around the globe mean for LauncherOne?
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155384.jpg)
OneWeb plans to build a 650-satellite constellation to provide global Internet access. Credit: OneWeb Ltd.

The Virgin Group put money into them. OneWeb is talking about a very large constellation and, yes, I think we're going to have a very substantial role there as one of their launch providers. The social mission of OneWeb is pretty clear and also shows us this is a serious part of the industry, a serious business.

Beyond OneWeb, what other customers have you identified?
 We've announced a few customers early on: Skybox Imaging, GeoOptics, Planetary Resources and Spaceflight Inc. In addition, we've gone out to a lot of the manufacturers of small satellites. They are not the end-customer necessarily, but are working directly with the end-customer. A few of those we've already announced publicly: the U.S. division of Surrey Satellite and Sierra Nevada. The government market is something that we'll happily serve, but it's not our primary focus. We're developing this launcher for the commercial market. There are a lot of well-established businesses that have been around for a long time and are not space businesses. They have started to take a closer and are asking themselves if space could be part of the portfolio of what they do.

SpaceX founder Elon Musk wants to deploy thousands of satellites into Earth orbit for a global Internet project. Are we seeing an entrepreneurial space race here?
 No, I don't think so. We at Virgin Galactic are big fans of what SpaceX has done and the results that they've achieved. I know Richard Branson and Elon Musk have a personal relationship. Both like a little competition. But mainly we see ourselves in neighboring spaces with similar philosophies. With LauncherOne, we're not getting Falcon 9 bigger. That's not our sweet spot.

If the various plans for new small launchers and satellites come to fruition, won't that exacerbate an already serious orbital debris problem?
 It is certainly a field in which we are engaged, taking a close look. Between us and our customer base, it's sort of a shared responsibility. But we're cognizant of the issue. We need to help solve the problem, not help contribute to the problem to the greatest extent possible.

What concerns you the most in getting LauncherOne off the ground and running as a commercial business?
 I think for us, both we and our customers have to remain incredibly vigilant about price. If we allow requirements creep to drive up our prices, every dollar we increase our price tag, it's taking away from our market.

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic's LauncherOne on Schedule for 2016 First Launch
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — March 16, 2015
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155438.jpg)
The Newton 3, developed by Virgin Galactic as the first stage of LauncherOne (above) will be capable of generating 265,000 to 335,000 newtons of thrust, uses liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants. Credit: Virgin Galactic
 
WASHINGTON — Virgin Galactic is on schedule to begin flights of its small-satellite launch vehicle by the end of 2016, hoping to tap into what the company's chief executive believes is a lucrative and growing market.
In a speech at the Satellite 2015 conference here, George Whitesides said the success of some small-satellite ventures in recent years, and the emergence of a number of new ones planning in some cases hundreds of satellites, offered a promising market for his company.
"There's several key trends converging now in the small space sector that have the potential to reshape our industry," he said. Those trends include an "insatiable demand" for communications and other data services, the application of mass production techniques to small satellites, and an influx of funding into the industry.
That potential, he argued, can't be fully realized if companies have to rely on secondary payload accommodations on other launches or deployment fr om the International Space Station, as many smallsats are currently launched. "With those secondary opportunities, you hardly get any choice of where and when you can fly," he said.
Whitesides hopes that Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne, first announced in 2012, can solve that by providing dedicated launches of small satellites, weighing up to about 225 kilograms, for less than $10 million. "As time has gone by, I've only gotten more and more excited about it," he said.
 (http://spacenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Newton3_testfire-Virgin_Galactic-757x258.jpg) (http://spacenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Newton3_testfire-Virgin_Galactic.jpg)
Virgin Galactic Newton 3 hot-fire test. Credit: Virgin Galactic

The company recently started hot-fire tests of an engine called Newton 3 developed by Virgin Galactic for the first stage of LauncherOne, Whitesides said. That engine, capable of generating 265,000 to 335,000 newtons of thrust, uses liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants.
"We're now to the point wh ere we're very confident that we can build a very affordable rocket," Whitesides said. After his speech, he said the company was on schedule to begin flights by the end of 2016, with even initial test flights likely carrying some satellites.
When Virgin Galactic unveiled LauncherOne in July 2012, the company announced several initial customers, including Skybox Imaging, GeoOptics, Spaceflight, Inc. and Planetary Resources. The company has signed up several additional customers since then, Whitesides said, but has not disclosed them publicly.
Virgin Galactic has also moved LauncherOne operations from the company's main facility in Mojave, California, to a new one in Long Beach, California, that the company announced in February. In addition to existing staff that moved to Long Beach, a job fair held March 7 at the Long Beach site attracted between 5,000 and 6,000 job applicants, Whitesides said, seeking about 100 open positions.
The decision to move LauncherOne work to Long Beach was based on a desire to access a larger potential workforce than possible in Mojave, a small town about 150 kilometers from Los Angeles. Unlike the development of SpaceShipTwo, which was done in conjunction with Scaled Composites in Mojave, Whitesides said Virgin Galactic was free with LauncherOne to find other locations in southern California with a larger pool of qualified workers to draw from.
Work continues on Mojave on a second SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle, replacing the one lost in a fatal crash in October 2014. "We're probably as much as 90-percent structurally complete" on that vehicle, he said, although he said there were "several months" of work remaining on the vehicle's other systems before flight tests could begin.
That work is in progress even as the National Transportation Safety Board continues its investigation into the accident. "We're a party in the investigation, so we can get a sense of what their findings are and, to the extent any are safety-related, we can act on them before the report comes out," he said, adding that he could not discuss any specific steps while the investigation is ongoing.

ЦитироватьPeter B. de Selding ‏@pbdes  (https://twitter.com/pbdes) 35 мин.35 минут назад (https://twitter.com/pbdes/status/633999630687072256)

Barry Matsumori is latest SpaceXer to join Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne startup. http://spacenews.com/former-spacexer-joins-virgin-galactics-launcherone/ ... (http://t.co/zeSEhOLXXr)

Peter B. de Selding ‏@pbdes  (https://twitter.com/pbdes) 3 ч.3 часа назад (https://twitter.com/pbdes/status/633956587925819392)

Former SpaceX commercial launch mgr Barry Matsumori joins Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne start-up, which counts multiple SpaceX alumni.

Peter B. de Selding ‏@pbdes  (https://twitter.com/pbdes) 15 авг. (https://twitter.com/pbdes/status/632614976885288960)

Industry officials: SpaceX now a recruiting grnd for Virgin Galactic VirginOne launcher prgram. What % of LauncherOne staff is from SpaceX?

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic Claims Progress on Smallsat Launch Vehicle
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — September 28, 2015
  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155534.jpg)LauncherOne, in its latest configuration, will be able to place more than 400 kilograms into Earth orbit, including 200 kilograms into sun-synchronous orbit. Credit: Virgin Galactic  
 
WASHINGTON — Virgin Galactic announced Sept. 28 that it has made "significant progress" on the engines that it will use on its LauncherOne small satellite launch vehicle, two weeks after the company said it was increasing the vehicle's performance.
In a statement, Virgin Galactic said it had successfully carried out a 20-second test firing of one engine that will be used in the first stage of the air-launched rocket and tested the a key component of the vehicle's second stage engine. Those tests took place at the company's test site in Mojave, California.
In a Sept. 25 test, Virgin Galactic fired the NewtonThree engine for approximately 20 seconds on a test stand. The pump-fed engine, which uses liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants, is designed to produce up to 73,500 pounds-force of thrust in LauncherOne's first stage. The test, according to the company, produced "high quality data about the engine during start-up, operation, and safe shutdown."
The company has also tested the gas generator for the smaller NewtonFour engine that will go on LauncherOne's upper stage. The gas generator, which burns a small amount of propellant to power the engine's pumps, fired for more than six minutes in each of the "full-duration" engine tests.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155533.png)
Virgin Galactic conducts a test of the NewtonThree engine it plans to use on the first stage of its LauncherOne smallsat launch vehicle. Credit: Virgin Galactic

"There is much work yet to be done, but the NewtonThree and NewtonFour test results are strongly encouraging," George Whitesides, chief executive of Virgin Galactic, said in the statement. "Thanks to our team, our test stands, and our manufacturing facilities, we are making steady progress on all of the key components of LauncherOne."
The engine tests come after Virgin Galactic announced Sept. 14 that it was increasing the payload capability of LauncherOne. When first introduced in 2012, the company said the vehicle could launch payloads of up to 225 kilograms into orbit. With the upgrade, the vehicle will be able to place more than 400 kilograms into a generic low Earth orbit, and 200 kilograms into the sun-synchronous orbit commonly used by remote sensing satellites.
Part of that increased performance comes from the additional thrust that the NewtonThree and NewtonFour engines produce over engines that the company originally developed for LauncherOne, NewtonOne and NewtonTwo, which the company now considers "demonstrator engines." The earlier engines used a simpler pressure-fed design, while the new ones use turbopumps that Virgin Galactic designed in cooperation with Barber Nichols Inc., a company that has built turbopumps for government and commercial customers.
LauncherOne will also use a different aircraft as a launch platform. Original plans called for the rocket to be deployed from WhiteKnightTwo, the aircraft Virgin Galactic developed for its SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle. Virgin Galactic said Sept. 14 that it is in "the final stages of acquiring a commercial aircraft" that will help enable that increased capacity. The company has not disclosed the specific make of aircraft it plans to use.

ЦитироватьKR пишет:
до конца десятилетия что только не полетит, прямо, расцвет космонавтики - 2, какой то

ЦитироватьAlex_II пишет:

ЦитироватьKR пишет:
до конца десятилетия что только не полетит, прямо, расцвет космонавтики - 2, какой то

При этом проектов, оплаченных государствами - не так уж и много...

ЦитироватьSalo пишет:
Платиновый не подойдёт?

ЦитироватьKR пишет:

ЦитироватьAlex_II пишет:

ЦитироватьKR пишет:
до конца десятилетия что только не полетит, прямо, расцвет космонавтики - 2, какой то

При этом проектов, оплаченных государствами - не так уж и много...

да. частники наше все. Видимо действительно массовые технологии доросли.
осталось найти какой нибудь золотой астероид.

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
Хотелось бы только, чтобы "дорастание" частников обходилось без трупов.

ЦитироватьOctober 14, 2015                
Virgin Galactic Wins NASA Contract To Launch More Than A Dozen Satellites On LauncherOne

We're designing LauncherOne to help researchers and innovators get their satellites into space affordably, responsively, and reliably, because we know that small satellites can successfully complete a staggering array of different types of mission. That's why we're excited and proud to announce today that NASA has purchased a flight on LauncherOne through its Venture Class Launch Services program. This flight—slated to happen just before the start of our routine commercial operations of LauncherOne—will carry 200 kilograms of payload into space, launching more than a dozen NASA-selected satellites into orbit.
We are grateful to have NASA as a customer of both parts of our business now—previously, NASA's Flight Opportunities Program purchased a flight for a dozen experiments on board SpaceShipTwo. NASA's leadership in the industry of space exploration is unquestioned, and having learned so many lessons from NASA over the years, we are excited to offer NASA and its partners a more affordable way to access space.
You can read all about today's announcement here (http://www.virgingalactic.com/press/virgin-galactic-wins-nasa-contract-to-launch-more-than-a-dozen-satellites-on-launcherone/) and check out our most recent 90 second hot fire test here (http://www.virgingalactic.com/newtonthree-rocket-engine-first-stage-of-launcherone-orbital-vehicle-achieves-90-second-hotfire/).

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185524.jpg) Peter B. de Selding ‏@pbdes  (https://twitter.com/pbdes)  
Planet Labs to launch 2 tech-demo sats on Virgin Galactic LauncherOne vehicle in 2016 and 2017.#IAC2015 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/IAC2015?src=hash)
  23:08 - 13 окт. 2015 г.  

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
Хотелось бы только, чтобы "дорастание" частников обходилось без трупов.

ЦитироватьAlex_II пишет:

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
Хотелось бы только, чтобы "дорастание" частников обходилось без трупов.

Государственная космонавтика без трупов не обошлась. А чего вдруг у частников такое право отбирать? А серьезно - никто не застрахован, на самом деле, хоть ежедневно экзамены по ТБ устраивай... И форма собственности не имеет к этому абсолютно никакого отношения.

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
В случае с Виржин - убили пилота на трансзвуке из за непродуманной логики управления, по причине банальной безграмотности и экономии средств. Большие аэрокосмические фирмы продвигаются осторожно, шаг за шагом, основательно закрепляясь на каждом достигнутом рубеже.

ЦитироватьAlex_II пишет:
А чего вдруг у частников такое право отбирать?

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
Нужно все же различать, жертвы при достижении чего то нового и жертвы в рутинных операциях.

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
Большие аэрокосмические фирмы продвигаются осторожно, шаг за шагом, основательно закрепляясь на каждом достигнутом рубеже.

ЦитироватьNot пишет:
А так называемые частники начали дурацкую гонку с лимитированнным бюджетом и неограниченным оптимизмом.

ЦитироватьVirgin Galactic Acquires Boeing 747 for LauncherOne Missions
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — December 4, 2015
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155578.jpg)
Using a Boeing 747 as the launch platform for LauncherOne will allow Virgin Galactic to double the vehicle's payload performance, increasing the size of the market it can serve, according to company officials. Credit: Virgin Galactic  
 
MELBOURNE, Fla. — Virgin Galactic announced Dec. 3 that it has purchased a Boeing 747 jetliner to serve as the new carrier aircraft for its LauncherOne small satellite launch vehicle.
The aircraft, unveiled during an event at the San Antonio, Texas, facility where the plane is being modified, will allow LauncherOne to carry heavier payloads than if it was launched from the company's WhiteKnightTwo airplane, as originally planned.
"We basically wanted to maximize the productive capacity of the Newton engines we were developing" for LauncherOne, said George Whitesides, chief executive of Virgin Galactic, in a Dec. 3 phone interview. The company studied how big they could make LauncherOne if not constrained by how much WhiteKnightTwo could carry, then looked at what aircraft could handle that vehicle.
The company concluded the 747 was the best choice for carrying the enlarged LauncherOne. Whitesides said the company then did "a very comprehensive survey of the entire commercial aircraft market," looking for used 747 aircraft with the best combination of cost, flight history and maintenance record.
That search ended up, ironically, with another Virgin company: the airline Virgin Atlantic. "Somewhat to our surprise, the answer was 'Cosmic Girl,'" Whitesides said, referring to the airplane's nickname. "It was a relatively young aircraft operated by Virgin Atlantic, and we had a lot of comfort in its maintenance." Whitesides said Virgin Galactic purchased the plane from Virgin Atlantic, but did not disclose the terms of the deal.
Cosmic Girl was built by Boeing in 2001 and delivered to Virgin Atlantic. The aircraft was in commercial service with the airline as recently as October, according to online flight records. The plane last flew Oct. 29, when it traveled from London to San Antonio.
Whitesides said the airplane will first undergo extensive inspection and maintenance known in aviation as a "D check" by VT San Antonio Aerospace, the aircraft maintenance company working with Virgin. That work will be completed early next year, after which work will start on modifying the airplane to serve as the LauncherOne platform.
LauncherOne will be attached to a pylon mounted on the left wing of the 747, between the fuselage and the left inboard engine. That location was included on the 747 to mount a fifth jet engine when ferrying engines, minimizing the structural modifications needed to the wing.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155579.jpg) (http://spacenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/launcherone-latimer.jpg)
Virgin Galactic test pilot Kelly Latimer stands in front of a model of the 747 that will carry LauncherOne, with the actual aircraft in the background, during a Dec. 3 event in San Antonio. Credit: Virgin Galactic

Whitesides said some structural elements of the wing will be strengthened to accommodate the rocket. There will also be electrical and fluid lines added to service the rocket, and updates to the plane's avionics to support launches. That work, he said, should be done by late 2016.
Virgin Galactic plans to use some of its current pilots to fly the 747 when it enters service. Whitesides said David Mackay, the company's chief test pilot, and Kelly Latimer, a former NASA and U.S. Air Force test pilot hired in November, have experience with the 747.
Virgin Galactic will make those modifications to the 747 in parallel with work on LauncherOne itself. "We're making progress on each of the subsystems," he said, including the Newton 3 and Newton 4 engines the company is developing to power the rocket and composite propellant tanks.
While Whitesides said earlier this year that Virgin Galactic was expecting to begin LauncherOne test flights by late 2016, that schedule has slipped. "We anticipate being able to do orbital tests in 2017," he said.
The decision to increase the size of LauncherOne and fly it from a 747 is a departure from the company's original plans, which called for using the same WhiteKnightTwo airplane that Scaled Composites developed for Virgin Galactic for its SpaceShipTwo suborbital spaceplane. WhiteKnightTwo will now be used exclusively for SpaceShipTwo missions.
The more powerful LauncherOne will be able to carry payloads up to 200 kilograms to sun-synchronous orbits, and up to 400 kilograms to other orbits. That increase in performance allows LauncherOne to accommodate a wider range of satellites.
"We're having a lot of conversations" with potential customers, Whitesides said. Besides the June contract for 39 launches of communications satellites for OneWeb and an October contract with NASA as part of the agency's Venture Class Launch Services program, he said Virgin Galactic has signed a couple more contracts with undisclosed customers. "I think we'll have more and more business as we get closer to our test launches," he said.
Separately, Whitesides said Virgin Galactic is completing the assembly of the second SpaceShipTwo, replacing the one lost in an October 2014 accident. The last major structural element of the vehicle, the main oxidizer tank, was installed last month, he said. Virgin Galactic expects to formally roll out the second SpaceShipTwo in early 2016 and start a series of ground and flight tests shortly thereafter.

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust  (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)  17 ч.17 часов назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/720735157402017792)  
Whitesides: we're building our LauncherOne factory with high-rate production in mind. #32SS (https://twitter.com/hashtag/32SS?src=hash)

  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust  (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)  17 ч.17 часов назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/720731728483000320)  
Whitesides: responsiveness key focus of LauncherOne, along with low cost. #32SS (https://twitter.com/hashtag/32SS?src=hash)

  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust  (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)  17 ч.17 часов назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/720731162151268353)  
George Whitesides, Virgin Galactic: we have full funding for LauncheOne smallsat launcher, ~200 people working on it. #32SS (https://twitter.com/hashtag/32SS?src=hash)

ЦитироватьSky and Space Global lands Branson deal

[/li]
• The Australian
• 3:31PM June 27, 2016
  

ASX-listed satellite firm Sky and Space Global has landed a deal with Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic to launch up to 200 nanosatellites in 2018.

The UK-based firm, led by former Israeli fighter pilot Meir Moalem, said it would launch the nanosatellites — which are about 80 per cent cheaper than traditional satellites — with Virgin Galactic's LauncherOne orbital launch vehicle in a bid to service equatorial countries with more cost-efficient voice calls, text messages and data services.
"LauncherOne is an aerial launcher, which means it is launched from a Boeing 747 that can take off from anywhere, and can launch to any orbit with a high flexibility in schedule and location," Mr Moalem said.
"After having initial discussions with Virgin Galactic, both sides came to realise the benefits of launching Sky and Space Global nanosatellites with LauncherOne.
"Our business plan is based on wholesale services, selling capacity to telco providers, much like the agreement we signed with SatSpace Africa (SSA). Our customers will come from the equatorial belt — that is, South and Central America, Africa, Asia — and also from airliners and shipping companies operating within our coverage area.
"The area that will be covered by Sky and Space Global's nanosatellite constellation is home to about 4 billion people."
Sky and Space Global is listed on the Australian sharemarket, but its aerospace operations are based in Europe and Israel.
According to Mr Moalem, Sky and Space Global's constellation will be lower cost and lower risk than other systems, and will be deployed by the end of the decade.
Barry A. Matsumori, Senior Vice President of Business Development & Advanced Concepts at Virgin Galactic, who has previously held roles at SpaceX and Qualcomm, told The Australian the small satellite market had been undeserved until now, with priority generally given to big satellites.
"We want to build a service that's regular, almost common, so that when small satellites want to go to space they don't have to wait," Mr Matsumori said.
"Say they're a cubesat, we'll go up so often that in fact a delay is a month, not 6 months or 18 months. Sky and Space Global were exactly what we built the service to be able to take care of; they're perfectly sized for what we are trying to do."
He said despite an explosion in late 2014 which claimed the life of a 39-year old pilot, Virgin Galactic was still very much pushing ahead with its suborbital space tourism program.
"That business is still very much alive," he said. "We rolled out the new Spaceship II design in February of this year with Sir Richard; what we haven't done is announce the launch date, we don't want to build up timetable pressures."
Shares in Sky and Space Global were 0.2 cents lower at 2.1 cents at 1215 AEST.
With AAP

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust  (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)
A. C. Charania, Virgin Galactic: LauncherOne work fully funded, test launches planned for 2nd half of 2017. #smallsat (https://twitter.com/hashtag/smallsat?src=hash)
 8:16 - 8 авг. 2016 г.

  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust  (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)
Charania: LaunchOne missions will fly out of Mojave for sun-synch missions; looking at other sites for lower inclination flights. #smallsat (https://twitter.com/hashtag/smallsat?src=hash)
 8:49 - 8 авг. 2016 г.

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185591.jpg) Brian Berger ‏@Berger_SN  (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN) 6 ч.6 часов назад (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN/status/786979456447614976)
Branson-backed @virgingalactic (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic)? Dalbello expects "graceful buildup" to 24/yr. #WSBR (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBR?src=hash)
 
  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185591.jpg) Brian Berger ‏@Berger_SN  (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN) 6 ч.6 часов назад (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN/status/786976910408581120)
Vector & Virgin Galactic counting on customers to pay more per kilogram for schedule certainty and a better ride. #WSBR (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBR?src=hash)
 
  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185591.jpg) Brian Berger ‏@Berger_SN  (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN) 6 ч.6 часов назад (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN/status/786975722409689090)
Dalbello: @virgingalactic (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic) hopes to eventually fly LauncherOne twice a month. #WSBR (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBR?src=hash)
 
  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185591.jpg) Brian Berger ‏@Berger_SN  (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN) 6 ч.6 часов назад (https://twitter.com/Berger_SN/status/786975285686243328)
"For all these vehicles, rate is essential...Without rate, you can't get the price people are looking for." @virgingalactic (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic)'s Rich Dalbello

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185349.jpg) Virgin Galactic ‏@virgingalactic  (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic)  13 ч.13 часов назад (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic/status/814569430885732352)  
Our #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) structures team met their 2016 goal of building tanks, interstages, and aft skirts for 4 launch vehicles. Well done, team
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/156408.jpg)

Цитироватьblik пишет:
Может кто нибудь ответить зачем для первоначального замысла субобитального туризма нужен самолет?

ЦитироватьAstro Cat пишет:
Если вы про носитель - то это же передвижной СК. Ему не нужен космодром, а лишь обычный аэродром. Поэтому надо учитывать стоимость СК для ракеты.И по мере совершенствования самолета-носителя будет расти его эффективность. Надо бы сверхзвуковой, имхо.

Цитироватьpkl пишет:
12 лет назад писали, что одним из преимуществ самолётного старта является возможность стартовать из разных точек при минимальных затратах на развёртывание инфраструктуры на новом месте. Благодаря чему туристы в разных полётах могут любоваться разными видами из иллюминатора.

Цитироватьpkl пишет:
То, что получится то, что получилось, тогда никто, наверное, представить не мог, включая самого Р. Брэнсона.

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust  (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)  4 ч.4 часа назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/818929012718313473)  
Stark: targeting December 2017 for VCLS launch of Virgin Galactic's Launcher One.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185349.jpg) Virgin Galactic ‏@virgingalactic  (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic) 2 ч назад (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic/status/831196868520468480)

Our #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) team continues to advance our rocket engines work. Here's a recent long duration, full thrust NewtonThree test. 73,500 lbf!
 
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/156802.jpg)

ЦитироватьGrus пишет:
Крылатый аппарат снижает вероятность раскрутки,

ЦитироватьFormer Boeing executive to lead Virgin's smallsat launch venture
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — March 2, 2017
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155694.jpg)
Employees of Virgin Orbit, the company being spun out of Virgin Galactic to focus on LauncherOne, pose at the company's Long Beach, California, facility. Credit: Virgin Orbit  
 
WASHINGTON — Virgin Galactic announced March 2 that it has picked a former Boeing space executive to lead its smallsat launch project, which is being spun out into a separate venture.
Dan Hart will be president of Virgin Orbit, a new company created from the division of Virgin Galactic that had been working on the LauncherOne air-launch system. Virgin Orbit is part of the portfolio of companies within the Virgin Group known as Galactic Ventures, which also includes Virgin Galactic and its manufacturing arm, The Spaceship Company.
"We really wanted a focused company for the small satellite launch market, because we knew that this is such an exciting moment for small satellite launch," said George Whitesides, chief executive of Virgin Galactic, in an interview.
The first president of Virgin Orbit will be Dan Hart, who worked for 34 years at Boeing in various satellite and launch vehicle programs. He was most recently vice president of government satellite systems at the company.
"I had been observing and admiring the transformation that has been going on in the industry" while contemplating the next phase of his career, Hart said in an interview. "The spirit here, the drive of the team to develop this launch system and really open new doors, is something that really appeals to me."
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155686.jpg) (http://spacenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/danhart.jpg)
Dan Hart, president of Virgin Orbit. Credit: Virgin Orbit

Virgin Galactic announced plans for LauncherOne in 2012. Originally, the rocket would launch from the same WhiteKnightTwo aircraft being developed for its SpaceShipTwo suborbital spacecraft. In 2015, Virgin Galactic announced that it had purchased a Boeing 747 aircraft that would serve as the launch platform for the rocket, providing increased performance for the rocket.
The LauncherOne effort had increasing become a part of Virgin Galactic distinct from its better-known suborbital spaceflight program. Besides its own carrier aircraft, LauncherOne was being developed at a separate facility in Long Beach, California. More than 200 Virgin Galactic employees there will now be part of Virgin Orbit, and Whitesides said the new company is continuing to hire additional staff. Virgin Galactic and The Spaceship Company have more than 500 employees, primarily in Mojave, California.
"We're still part of this family, so there will still be different interactions depending on technical areas," Whitesides said of the relationship among Virgin Orbit, Virgin Galactic and The Spaceship Company. "We think that having a dedicated team is really going to be important for the mission success and customer focus that this market demands."
Whitesides said Virgin Orbit is still on track for an initial test launch of LauncherOne by the end of this year. "We're well through development of all major subsystems," including the engines that will power the two-stage rocket, the vehicle's structures and other major elements of the vehicle. Modifications of the 747, being done by L-3 Technologies in Waco, Texas, should be complete in the next few months.
"The heavy focus over the next number of months will be on integration and initial operations," said Hart.
Whitesides said the company has continued to see demand for LauncherOne. "We've been signing up additional customers. Some of them want to be public and some of them don't," he said. He added he did not expect changes in the company's deal with OneWeb, who signed a contract in 2015 for 39 LauncherOne launches, because of OneWeb's merger with Intelsat announced Feb. 28.
"There is still not a responsive, high-flight-rate, low-cost small satellite launch manufacturer in the U.S.," Whitesides said, "and I think we're working hard to become that."

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186040.jpg)  Chris B - NSF‏ @NASASpaceflight  (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight)  3 ч.3 часа назад (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/837274952478908417)
Related to LauncherOne (https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2016/06/virgin-galactic-prepare-busy-launcherone-future/ ... (https://t.co/yIhpeJXa8T)) - Virgin Orbit: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=40634.msg1649238#msg1649238 ... (https://t.co/WQvGxTh8pQ) - part of the LauncherOne payload envelope options.
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/156922.jpg)

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186054.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 15 мар. (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/842144666959011841)

Testing of our NewtonFour rocket engine (for #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) upper stage) continues! Now w/ diffuser tube to simulate lower backpressures
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/157221.jpg)

Цитировать Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)
Because we know you love rocket engines: Full-thrust, long duration NewtonFour (upper stage engine) test last week. 1 of a couple that day!
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/157327.jpg)

Цитировать (https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/873715228755730433/CnwHjR7W_bigger.jpg) Megs‏ @megsylhydrazine (https://twitter.com/megsylhydrazine) 14 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/megsylhydrazine/status/874496467376906241)

Successful hotfire of @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) NewtonThree engine for LauncherOne on 6/6/17 Objective: throttle demonstration (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png) https://youtu.be/TqOzNDYr83s (https://t.co/AwvRow4Wcc)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - NewtonThree Hotfire (5 June 2017)

 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220779.jpg)  (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 12 июн. 2017 г.

At Virgin Orbit, we test our rocket engines all the time. Here's a video of a typical test, conducted at our facilities in Mojave, CA. In this video, we test throttling down our NewtonThree rocket engine--the single rocket engine that will power the main stage of our LauncherOne rocket.

ЦитироватьLauncherOne

Virgin Galactic, later spun off as Virgin Orbit, announced in July 2012 the design of its new LauncherOne air-launched space launch system. The
LauncherOne is an expendable, two stage rocket with liquid RP-1 kerosene and liquid oxygen as propellants . The first stage is powered by the Newton-3 engine. The second stage, featuring the Newton-1 engine, is reignitable for orbit insertion. Payloads will be accommodated within a fairing approximately 1 meter in diameter, with a cylindrical shape for the first 77 cm and a conical section above.
LauncherOne is being developed by The Spaceship Company (TSC) of Mojave. TSC is a partnership of Virgin Galactic and Mojave, Calif.-based Scaled Composites, a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman. The stages and shroud, including structures, engines, and Launch Vehicle/Pylon Interface, will be manufactured at TSC's FAITH production facility. Other components, such as avionics and secondary subsystems will be delivered to the production facility by world-class suppliers.
After lift-off with the carrier aircraft, LauncherOne will be released from the airplane at an altitude of approximately 15 km above mean sea level. LauncherOne will free fall for approximately four seconds before the first stage ignites. The two stages operate in sequence, with the potential for the second stage to relight, and the payload is delivered to a designated low-earth orbit.
Originally it was to use the same WhiteKnightTwo (WK2) mother ship as the manned suborbital SpaceShipTwo (http://space.skyrocket.de/doc_lau/spaceshiptwo.htm). Sometimes in 2014, the concept was scaled up for increased performance, using the larger NewtonThree and NewtonFour engines and a Boeing 747-400 carrier plane called "Cosmic Girl" replacing the smaller WhiteKnightTwo.
A maiden launch is planned for 2017. Initially, LauncherOne missions will be staged from Mojave Spaceport. Virgin Orbit has completed launch assessments the primary launch site of the Mojave Air and Spaceport (MHV) in California and for a variety of operating locations including the Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida, NASA Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) in Virginia. Virgin Orbit is prepared to obtain approvals to operate in locations other than Mojave based on customer interest.

Version    [TH]
[/TH][TH]Aircraft[/TH] [TH]Stage 1[/TH][TH]Stage 2[/TH][TH]LauncherOne[/TH]

Boeing 747-400	Stage 1 / NewtonThree	Stage 2 / NewtonFour

[TH]Performance (kg)[/TH] [TH]LEO[/TH] [TH]LPEO[/TH] [TH]SSO[/TH] [TH]GTO[/TH] [TH]GEO[/TH] [TH]MolO[/TH] [TH]IP[/TH][TH]LauncherOne[/TH]

500		300	-	-	-	-

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155819.jpg)
LauncherOne with B747-400 [Virgin Galactic]
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155818.jpg)
LauncherOne [Virgin Galactic]

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - NewtonFour Hotfire (29 June 2017)

 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220779.jpg)  (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 7 июл. 2017 г.

LauncherOne is powered by two rocket engines—a single NewtonThree on the main stage and a single NewtonFour on the upper stage. Both engines are turbopump-fed, gas generator cycle, LOX/RP-1 engines developed in-house here at Virgin Orbit. Here's a typical test of the NewtonFour on our test stand up in Mojave, CA, in which the engine runs for a full six minutes—the same duration it would run during a full orbital launch. By popular demand, we're posting this in real time--all six minutes of rockety goodness!

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - Cosmic Girl Homecoming

 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220779.jpg)  (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 1 авг. 2017 г.

Welcome Home, Cosmic Girl!
 
On July 31, 2017 Virgin Orbit's 747-400 named Cosmic Girl, touched down for the first time in Long Beach Airport. For our airport neighbors, it was a rare sighting of a 747 -- and a mobile rocket launcher at that. For Virgin Orbit employees and supporters, including Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia, the homecoming marked the completion of significant modification work that enables her to launch rockets for our satellite customers.

ЦитироватьЭто видео было удалено пользователем.

Сожалеем об этом.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/194418.png)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit plans 2018 first launch
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — August 2, 2017

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155739.jpg)
Cosmic Girl, the modified Boeing 747 that will be the launch platform for Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne, on display at Long Beach Airport in California. Virgin Orbit's manufacturing facility is located adjacent to the airport. Credit: Virgin Orbit

WASHINGTON — Virgin Orbit, the spinoff of Virgin Galactic that is developing the LauncherOne small launch vehicle, is now planning a first flight of that rocket in the first half of 2018, the company said Aug. 1.

Virgin Orbit updated the timetable for LauncherOne in a statement announcing the arrival of the rocket's carrier aircraft, a converted Boeing 747, at Long Beach Airport in California, where Virgin Orbit has its manufacturing facility. The plane recently completed an extensive modification program to serve as the air-launch platform for LauncherOne.

Спойлер

When Virgin Galactic announced LauncherOne in July 2012 at the Farnborough International Airshow in England, it planned to use the same WhiteKnightTwo aircraft built for the company's SpaceShipTwo suborbital spaceplane. The original intent was to minimize development by focusing on only the launch vehicle.

The company changed direction in December 2015 when it announced it was acquiring a 747 to serve as a dedicated aircraft for LauncherOne missions. The 747, previously in service as a Virgin Atlantic jetliner and known as "Cosmic Girl," underwent extensive inspections and modifications in Texas to serve as the launch platform for LauncherOne. Those modifications include the installation of a pylon between the left inboard jet engine and aircraft fuselage where LauncherOne will be mounted.

Those modifications are now complete, and Virgin Orbit, spun off from Virgin Galactic in March, said that the aircraft has now received an experimental airworthiness certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration, allowing test flights to begin.

"Cosmic Girl, our first stage to orbit, is finally home," Virgin Orbit Chief Executive Dan Hart said in an Aug. 1 statement, a day after the aircraft flew to Long Beach. "Virgin Orbit is in the home stretch of integrating our LauncherOne rocket and ground systems for launch and to support our customers' missions."

"It has been amazing to watch Cosmic Girl transform from a commercial airliner to a flying launchpad," Tim Buzza, vice president of launch for Virgin Orbit, said in the same statement. "We are excited to begin our flight test program and continue towards our vision of launching anyone, anywhere, any time."

The flight test program, and initial launches, will take place from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California. Those launches, the company said in the statement, are now expected to begin in the first half of 2018.

Earlier this year, when Virgin Orbit spun out from Virgin Galactic (http://spacenews.com/former-boeing-executive-to-lead-virgins-smallsat-launch-venture/), company officials still believed that an initial launch could take place by the end of 2017. In a presentation at the Small Payload Rideshare Symposium at the Applied Physics Laboratory in June, a NASA presentation listed a December 2017 launch for the LauncherOne mission under contract through the agency's Venture Class Launch Services program.

LauncherOne, in its current configuration, can place about 300 kilograms into a 500-kilometer sun-synchronous orbit. In a June 21 panel discussion on small satellites held by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Richard Dalbello, vice president of business development and government affairs for Virgin Galactic, said the estimated price for a LauncherOne mission was "about $12 million."

[свернуть]

ЦитироватьСпециально для воздушного старта были разработаны ракеты LauncherOne, способные доставить на низкую околоземную орбиту около 1000 килограммов полезного груза.

ЦитироватьВ итоге Virgin Orbit надеется добиться стоимости запуска около 10 миллионов долларов.

ЦитироватьДимитър пишет:

ЦитироватьСпециально для воздушного старта были разработаны ракеты LauncherOne, способные доставить на низкую околоземную орбиту около 1000 килограммов полезного груза.

Вообще-то говорили про 400 кг на НОО.

ЦитироватьВ итоге Virgin Orbit надеется добиться стоимости запуска около 10 миллионов долларов.

Искренне желаю им успеха!

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 16 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/894233621757689860)

Melissa Moreno, New Mexico St Univ: INCA cubesat for neutron flux studies slated for launch in "early 2018" on LauncherOne. #smallsat (https://twitter.com/hashtag/smallsat?src=hash)

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:
А это всё Вирджин галактик?

Цитироватьtnt22 пишет:
Virgin Orbit выпустила LauncherOne Service Guide (https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5915eeab9de4bb10e36a9eac/t/598882d003596ea150e8f3aa/1502118612306/service-guide.pdf) - 2472945 B, 40 стр, 2017-08-07 15:41:06 UTC

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186040.jpg) Chris B - NSF‏ @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight) 8 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/896041518280192000)

ARTICLE: Virgin Orbit sign SITAEL contract for LauncherOne satellite launch - https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2017/08/virgin-orbit-sitael-launch-contract/ ... (https://t.co/SRXIzKVIzw)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/165447.jpg)

Спойлер

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/165448.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/165449.jpg)

[свернуть]

Цитировать

Virgin Orbit sign SITAEL contract for LauncherOne satellite launch (https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2017/08/virgin-orbit-sitael-launch-contract/)

Цитироватьторговлей билетами в космос? Клиенты идут косяком?

ЦитироватьTAU пишет: 
Идут, идут. 

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67521.jpg) Stephen Clark‏ @StephenClark1 (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/907537241819553792)

Virgin Orbit's Dan Hart: Pathfinder for LauncherOne completed in last few weeks, shipping to Mojave for tanking tests. Test flight next yr.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/167146.jpg)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit still expects to fly twice a month in 2020 despite delayed test campaign
by Caleb Henry (http://spacenews.com/author/caleb-henry/) — September 12, 2017  (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155694.jpg)
Employees of Virgin Orbit, the company spun off from Virgin Galactic to focus on LauncherOne, pose at the company's Long Beach, California, facility. Credit: Virgin Orbit. Credit: Virgin Orbit  
 
PARIS — Virgin Orbit says it will perform 24 missions with its LauncherOne small-satellite booster in 2020 despite pushing intitial test flights into 2018.
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/155686.jpg)
Dan Hart, CEO of Virgin Orbit. Credit: Virgin Orbit

Virgin Orbit, before being spun off from human spaceflight-focused Virgin Galactic in March, had set out to complete around three test flights of LauncherOne before ramping up for commercial operations.
Dan Hart, who was Virgin Orbit's president in March and promoted to CEO in June, took responsibility for the delay.
"I came in about six months ago to the team and I did make a few changes in our test program to add a little more hardware, and that did push out the flight tests, but we will get into flight tests in the early part of 2018; we'll get into production," he said Sept. 12 during a panel discussion at Euroconsult's World Satellite Business Week here. "That gives us plenty of ramp-up time to get to the 24-level in 2020."
Hart said Virgin Orbit's Long Beach, California, factory is designed to support that rapid launch cadence. The company has all the necessary equipment, he said, and is in the final stages of ramping up personnel to accommodate that volume of launchers.
As an air-launched rocket, LauncherOne can avoid many of the weather delays that confound ground-based launch campaigns.
"We'll get up into flight in the first part of 2018, and then we will be ramping up quickly. We are going into commercial operation next year, and then doubling our launch rate in 2019, and doubling again in 2020," he said, adding that the company "will have customers on flights number two and three."
Hart said Virgin Orbit completed the assembly of the first LauncherOne rocket a few weeks ago, which will be used for "tanking tests and stage firings" in Mojave, California.  
The Mojave Spaceport is the first location for LauncherOne missions, though Hart stressed the rocket's air-launch design from the wing of a modified Boeing 747 makes it launchable from numerous locations. That aircraft, known as Cosmic Girl, arrived in Mojave roughly six weeks ago, he said.
LauncherOne is a two-stage liquid oxygen/kerosene vehicle designed to carry up to 300 kilograms to a 500 kilometer sun-synchronous orbit. Virgin Orbit customers for LauncherOne include NASA, Sky and Space Global, and OneWeb

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185973.jpg)  Caleb Henry‏ @CHenry_SN (https://twitter.com/CHenry_SN)
.@Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) talking 24 launches in 2020. Rapidly scaling launch rate.
 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/167142.jpg)
  2:17 - 12 сент. 2017 г.

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 39 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/910553786984230912)

Our flying launch pad, the 747 'Cosmic Girl,' is already in our test flight campaign. Here's a quick peek of her up at @MojaveAirport (https://twitter.com/MojaveAirport) – Virgin Orbit (https://twitter.com/search?q=place%3A0c81ee106d95a000)

Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/910553786984230912)

Цитироватьhttps://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/14/virgin-orbit-announces-contract-to-launch-a-dozen-cloud-constellation-satellites.html

Virgin Orbit announces contract to launch a dozen Cloud Constellation satellites

[/li]
• Virgin Orbit signed a contract to launch a dozen Cloud Constellation satellites.
• The company's LauncherOne system is still in development, and plans to test the rocket in the first half of next year. rocket's first test flight
• "These missions wouldn't have been possible even a few short years ago," Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart said.
  

Michael Sheetz (https://www.cnbc.com/michael-sheetz/)   | @thesheetztweetz (https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz)
Published 3:27 PM ET Thu, 14 Sept 2017  Updated 7:12 PM ET Thu, 14 Sept 2017

Air-launch rocket builder Virgin Orbit took another step in making low-cost rockets a reality in a new deal with satellite developer Cloud Constellation.

The Virgin Galactic spinoff, which is owned by billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson, on Tuesday signed an agreement to launch a dozen communications satellites for Cloud Constellation's SpaceBelt system. The rocket company expects to begin delivering on the contract with its LauncherOne system in 2019.

"These missions wouldn't have been possible even a few short years ago," Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart said in a statement at the World Satellite Business Week event in Paris.

The low-Earth orbit constellation will be the backbone of SpaceBelt, to create a space-based data storage network. The individual units, considered small by the commercial space industry, each weigh around 400 kilograms or more than 800 pounds.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/137045.jpg) (https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/14/virgin-orbit-announces-contract-to-launch-a-dozen-cloud-constellation-satellites.html#)
Source: Virgin Orbit
The two-stage expendable rocket and a fully-reusable air-launch platform of the LauncherOne service.

"The LauncherOne system was literally designed for companies and missions like ours," Cloud Constellation President Cliff Beek said.

Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne system is still in development. The company is planning the rocket's first test flight for early next year, with the system's Boeing 747-400 launcher in its final stages of flight testing. Virgin Orbit intends the two-stage LauncherOne system for use as both an expendable or reusable air-launched platform.

Branson's rocket company has also signed launch contracts with OneWeb, NASA, Sky and Space Global, and Sitael.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - NewtonFour Hotfire with Gimbal (25 September 2017)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220779.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 3 окт. 2017 г.

LauncherOne is powered by two rocket engines—a single NewtonThree on the main stage and a single NewtonFour on the upper stage. Both engines are turbopump-fed, gas generator cycle, LOX/RP-1 engines developed in-house here at Virgin Orbit. In this test, the rocket engine gimbals--in other words, it pivots--over a large range of motion. In flight, gimbaling allows the rocket engine to change the direction of thrust--and thereby steer the rocket. We've added a diagram on the left hand side of the screen to show the orientation of the engine throughout the test.

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 13 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/919977770444259328)

Fun photo captured by 1 of our engineers last week: Our flying launch pad in the skies above 1 of our rocket engine test stands #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/169281.jpg)

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185349.jpg) Virgin Galactic‏Подлинная учетная запись @virgingalactic (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic) 11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/virgingalactic/status/922900185465982977)

It's official: FAA has added our future home base @Spaceport_NM (https://twitter.com/Spaceport_NM) as an approved launch site in our operator license. We are getting #NMReady (https://twitter.com/hashtag/NMReady?src=hash)

ЦитироватьI'm pleased to announce the intention of the Public Investment Fund (PIF) of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), pending approval by the US government, to invest approximately $1 billion into our US based space companies, Virgin Galactic, The Spaceship Company and Virgin Orbit.

ЦитироватьСаудовская Аравия инвестирует в компании Брэнсона $1 млрд
 Королевство Саудовской Аравии планирует инвестировать $1 млрд в международный конгломерат компаний миллиардера Ричарда Брэнсона Virgin Group. Об этом сообщает CNBC со ссылкой на заявление компании.
ак отмечается в сообщении, Эр-Рияд планирует вложить деньги в работы космических компаний конгломерата, а именно Virgin Galactic, The Spaceship Company и Virgin Orbit. В Virgin Group рассказали, что контракт был заключен на совместную работу по полетам в космос, запуску спутников и космическим развлечениям. Также он подразумевает вложение дополнительных средств в размере $480 млн.
В феврале 2016 года компания Virgin Galactic, основателем которой является Брэнсон, представила новый пилотируемый космический корабль для туристических полетов серии SpaceShipTwo. Он может перевозить шесть космических туристов и двух пилотов. Кроме того, в открытом космосе на борту корабля пассажиры могут испытать состояние невесомости в течение трех минут.
В начале октября сообщалось, что Брэнсон инвестирует свои средства в проект по строительству курортной зоны на побережье Красного моря в Саудовской Аравии. Таким образом миллиардер станет первым иностранным инвестором этого проекта.
Как писал Брэнсон на сайте Virgin Galactic, курортная зона будет занимать 50 островов между городами Умлуж и Аль-Вайх. Она сможет обеспечить работой 35 тыс. человек. На данный момент территория, на которой будет создана курортная зона, не тронута цивилизацией.
Реализацией проекта по строительству курортной зоны на побережье Красного моря занимается Суверенный фонд Саудовской Аравии. Начать строительство планируется в 2019 году. Первый его этап должен завершиться к 2022 году, когда в курортной зоне будут открыты отели и возведены объекты инфраструктуры.
Во всемирном рейтинге Forbes Ричард Брэнсон занимает 324-е место. Его состояние оценивается в $5,1 млрд.

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 26 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/928716979447275520)

For the first time, we've shipped a complete #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) rocket (minus only payload and fairing) from our rocket factory. This particular wonderful machine is supporting fueling and integrated stage testing.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/170776.jpg)

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Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 5 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/931179379379580928)

Some non-NewSpace Europe news: Virgin Orbit announces today their first DOD contract for a LauncherOne mission, through Defense Innovation Unit Experimental. It will launch tech demo satellites as early as January 2019.

 (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185973.jpg) Caleb Henry‏ @CHenry_SN (https://twitter.com/CHenry_SN) 4 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/CHenry_SN/status/931179696448004096)

DOD just gave @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) a contract to launch a Space Test Program (STP) mission. Release says "as early as January 2019." DoD's Defense Innovation Unit Experimental (DIUx) helped arrange the launch.

ЦитироватьМиллиардера Ричарда Брэнсона обвинили в сексуальных домогательствах


Миллиардер и предприниматель Ричард Брэнсон, основатель корпорации Virgin Group и входящей в нее компании Virgin Galactic, планирующей организовывать туристические космические полеты, обвинен в сексуальных домогательствах. О них пострадавшая рассказала на Фейсбуке в рамках посвященного сексуальному насилию флэшмоба #metoo.

По словам девушки, Антонии Джене, в 2010 году она была бэк-вокалисткой у певца, выступавшего на вечеринке на острове Неккер, принадлежащем Брэнсону. Миллиардер якобы сначала уткнулся лицом между ее грудей и издал звук, имитирующий шум моторной лодки (звук летящей ракеты - Чебурашка), а затем упрашивал ее показать ему грудь и провести остаток вечера в полуголом виде. «Никто не понимал, почему я не злюсь, потому что обычно я просто взрываюсь. Но я была слишком шокирована», — пишет Джене.

Пресс-секретарь Брэнсона отмечает, что никто из приглашенного музыкального коллектива «не выглядел расстроенным». «У Ричарда не было намерения обижать кого-то или заставлять чувствовать некомфортно», — добавляет он.

ЦитироватьПресс-секретарь Брэнсона отмечает, что никто из приглашенного музыкального коллектива «не выглядел расстроенным». «У Ричарда не было намерения обижать кого-то или заставлять чувствовать некомфортно», — добавляет он.

Цитироватьhttp://www.parabolicarc.com/2017/11/26/richard-branson-accused-sexual-assault-joss-stone-backup-singer/
One of Joss Stone's backup singers, Antonia Jenae, has accused Virgin Galactic Founder Richard Branson of "sexual assault" (https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4995275/richard-branson-motorboating-singer-claims/) in an incident she says occurred on the billionaire's private Caribbean island in 2010.

"We were in the pool and there was a big, beautiful statue of a goddess there with her boobs out.
"Richard Branson tried to get me to show him my boobs and I said: 'No!' I was wearing a one-piece swimsuit and at the time I was very heavy chested."

[....]
Mum-of-two Antonia said: "We were by the bar and he was saying bye to everyone. He came up to me and put his face in my breasts.

"He went 'brrrrrr' and just walked away. It was surreal, totally out of the blue. Joss and I were like, 'What the hell was that?!' Everyone was wondering why I wasn't angry because I'm usually a firebrand. But I was just too shocked."
Antonia said: "His behaviour was disgusting. I feel like it was sexual assault."

A Virgin Group spokesman issued the following statement on behalf of Branson:

Цитировать"Richard has no recollection of this matter. Neither do his family and friends who were with him at the time. There would never have been any intention to offend or make anyone feel uncomfortable. Richard apologises if anyone felt that way."

The allegations come on the heels of news of an incident in an Australian restaurant involving Branson that was described by Formula One driver Jenson Button in his new book, ""Life to the Limit."  Button said the "very, very drunk" billionaire approached his future wife Jessica Michibata (http://www.businessinsider.com/jenson-button-says-richard-branson-made-his-ex-wife-uncomfortable-2017-10) and began flirting with her.
...

Цитировать (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 43 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/950088344138145793)

Skrobot: other VCLS launch contract, with Virgin Orbit, planned for no earlier than August. Launching 13 cubesats into polar orbit. #TRBAM (https://twitter.com/hashtag/TRBAM?src=hash)

Цитироватьus2-star пишет:
Virgin Orbit - NewtonThree Hotfire (9 January 201 8)  (https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=epIB4cqKDT4)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Verified account @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2h ago (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/963486660817137669)

Recently, we conducted two Launch Campaign Rehearsals—full-on sessions where our technicians and engineers prepare a LauncherOne rocket as though it were launch day and the countdown clock was ticking towards t-minus-zero.

2h ago (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/963486661643354114)

Propellant tanks are loaded and pressurized, software is loaded up, and our mission control crew are at their consoles, overseeing it all. These rehearsals provide a great chance to test out everything from the ground support equipment to the call-outs and procedures.

2h ago (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/963486662423560192)

It is imperative that we be safe, precise, and systematic. Since we are building a system that is designed for flexibility, it bodes well that our very first launch campaign rehearsal was completed in one extended shift—and even better that our second rehearsal was 40% faster.

2h ago (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/963486663375597568)

There's still important work to do as we finish qualification of our major assemblies and systems for LauncherOne—but our first orbital flight grows closer with every test and every milestone.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/173352.jpg)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 29m ago (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/964214407306928128)

Monica Jan, Virgin Orbit: we're planning for first orbital launch around 3rd quarter of this year. Planning 12 launches in 2019, 24 in 2020. #CDSmallSat18 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CDSmallSat18?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 8 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/967109672372133888)

By popular demand, here is the latest fairing test video! The fairing protects the payload from dynamic pressure and heat. Our fairings are tested countless times before they make their debut. In this instance, we are testing the separation mechanisms that split the two halves.

https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/967109102357831681/pu/vid/640x360/5X7wbkdeogkMZTDu.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/967109102357831681/pu/vid/640x360/5X7wbkdeogkMZTDu.mp4)
(прямая ссылка (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/967109102357831681/pu/vid/640x360/5X7wbkdeogkMZTDu.mp4))
Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/967109672372133888) (0:45)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - NewtonThree Full Duration Hotfire (17 April 2018 )

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 23 апр. 2018 г.

We are always excited to test our most powerful engine, the NewtonThree, for long duration. During this specific test, we completed a full 'mission duty cycle'--a fancy way of saying that we fired the engine for as long as it would fire on a full flight to orbit. We also gimbaled the engine, meaning we changed the angle of thrust by several degrees during the course of the firing. The ability to gimbal is important, since that is one of the main ways a rocket 'steers' on its way to space!

As a reminder: our LauncherOne rocket has two rocket engines on board: a single NewtonThree on the main stage and a single NewtonFour on the upper stage. You can see a full duration NewtonFour firing here: https://youtu.be/AGZF4o-gwHk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGZF4o-gwHk)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 9 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/992178394740633600)

Our factory in Long Beach, CA is filling up rocket hardware! We build almost all of #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) in-house, and it's awesome to watch hardware come together. We're working hard to prepare for our first orbital flights--and having a lot of fun along the way.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/163647.jpg)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - NewtonThree Hotfire with Gimbal (25 April 2018 )

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 9 мая 2018 г.

As our inaugural launch gets closer, we continue to test the more technical features of our most powerful engine, the NewtonThree. This recent test demonstrated the engine's gimballing capabilities, a critical steering mechanism that ensures we put our customer's satellites precisely where they need to be in orbit. And no, this clip isn't sped up — we programmed the nozzle to pivot faster and faster as the test progresses.

Just two engines power our LauncherOne rocket: The NewtonThree on the main stage, and the NewtonFour on the upper stage. Have you seen our NewtonThree full duration hotfire test? If not, check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYVdd... (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYVddR3GLi8)

Цитироватьtnt22 пишет:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUTRxJjYPbY

ЦитироватьСергей пишет:
Любопытный узел подвески и уплотнения подвижной КС.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 8 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1000072703901126661)

Monica Jan, Virgin Orbit: looking at third stage options for LauncherOne to support missions beyond low Earth orbit. #ISDC2018 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/ISDC2018?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 25 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1002927814318927873)

Sirisha Bandla, Virgin Orbit: no payloads on the first LauncherOne mission, but second one will be for NASA [Venture Class Launch Services, presumably]. #DPSS18 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/DPSS18?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1004127337019871237)

It's a LauncherOne on the move! Belated apologies to any Long Beach motorists, but this Very Important Rocket has places to be. We've still got some milestones ahead, but every day we get closer to flight. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186040.jpg)Chris B - NSF‏ @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight) 16 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/1009132890473590784)

ARTICLE: Virgin Orbit ready LauncherOne rocket for maiden flight -

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/06/virgin-orbit-launcherone-maiden-flight/ ... (https://t.co/wwCnYgqcBM)

- by Michael Baylor (@nextspaceflight (https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight))

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185874.jpg)Michael Baylor‏ @nextspaceflight (https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight) 4 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1009689274248073216)

Virgin Orbit may perform a drop test of the LauncherOne rocket near Edwards AFB using the 747 carrier aircraft Cosmic Girl. The drop test is part of the captive carry test campaign which is slated to begin by July 23rd, 2018.

More info: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=45874.msg1832083;boardseen#new ... (https://t.co/a7LGAEyS09)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/165595.jpg)

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:
А что с "билетами в космос"? Всё?

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. пишет:

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:
А что с "билетами в космос"? Всё?

Ими занимается Вирджин Галактик.

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. пишет:

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:
А что с "билетами в космос"? Всё?

Ими занимается Вирджин Галактик.

А это уже очередная другая Вирджиния?

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. пишет:

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. пишет:

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:
А что с "билетами в космос"? Всё?

Ими занимается Вирджин Галактик.

А это уже очередная другая Вирджиния?

Их много. Орбитальными пусками занимается Virgin Orbit, а Virgin Orbit VOX Space занимается рынком национальной безопасности

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет: 
А почему в названии темы - Галактик?

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1012118781764689920)

Stephen Eisele, Virgin Orbit: our next major milestone is a captive carry flight, in just over a week. Next after that will be orbital flight test, which will be as soon as possible after we analyze data from captive carry.
#newspace2018 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/newspace2018?src=hash)

11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1012119813517279232)

Eisele: hope to do first launch by the end of the summer, but depends on outcome of captive carry test.
#NewSpace2018 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/NewSpace2018?src=hash)

11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1012120326740717569)

Eisele: will deploy test rocket (without ignition) at end of captive carry flight. Only plan for a single captive carry test, but may do more if needed.
#NewSpace2018 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/NewSpace2018?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 16 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1012826763531988992)

Exciting news: just today, @FAANews (https://twitter.com/FAANews) granted us our Reusable Launch Vehicle Mission Specific License for #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash)! You can't launch without a license, so this is a big step forward for us. 1/5

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/165424.jpg)

16 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1012826815784673280)

This week, we also received @USDOT (https://twitter.com/USDOT) approval to ship #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) to meet our carrier aircraft once we're ready to launch. Another step forward! 2/5

16 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1012826910986866688)

Next up: we'll be mating our pylon to our 747. That's the mechanism that holds #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) safely and securely under Cosmic Girl's wing. Then, we'll move into our captive carry test campaign, starting with flying with just the aircraft and the pylon. 3/5

16 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1012826978204860416)

After that, we'll practice flying with a fully integrated #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash). On that rocket's final flight, we'll run one more key test: dropping the rocket from Cosmic Girl. It'll free fall all the way back to Earth, collecting data all the way. 4/5

16 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1012827040666406912)

That'll set us up nicely for our first orbital flight! This test campaign will be some of the hardest but also the most fun stuff we've ever done. It's going to be an awesome couple of weeks. Can't wait to share more as we check off key milestones. 5/5

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 4 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1014948024697536517)

In the next few days, we'll start the process of attaching our launch pylon (the "hooks" that secure the rocket to the plane) to #CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash). Soon after, we'll conduct our first test flights w/ the pylon before moving on to a series of captive carry flights w/ #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash).

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166317.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 35 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1014969277227544576)

It'll still be several weeks before you see us fly with a #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) rocket under #CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash)'s wing, but we still feel good about reaching orbit and getting into commercial service this year!

Цитировать https://virginorbit.com/press/2018/7/6/virgin-orbit-and-sitael-sign-agreement-for-long-term-collaboration-and-investment
VIRGIN ORBIT AND SITAEL SIGN AGREEMENT FOR LONG-TERM COLLABORATION AND INVESTMENT
PUGLIA, ITALY – JULY 6, 2018 – Virgin Orbit and SITAEL (http://www.sitael.com/) announced today that they have signed an agreement for extensive collaboration between the two firms, including multiple orbital launches and investment into future launch system evolution.

The agreement was signed by SITAEL CEO Nicola Zaccheo and Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart on Friday during a ceremony featuring Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson, Angel Group founder Mr. Vito Pertosa, the President of the Italian Space Agency Mr. Roberto Battiston, the Italian Minister Ms. Barbara Lezzi, the President of Apulia Region Mr. Michele Emiliano, the President of the Aeroporti di Puglia Mr. Tiziano Onesti, and the Commercial Officer of the U.S. Embassy in Rome Todd Avery.

SITAEL previously sel ected Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne rocket to launch μHETsat, a novel electric propulsion technology demonstrator mission built for the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Italian Space Agency, Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI). Today, this new Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) recognizes the significant steps the two organizations have taken toward a broader, longer-term relationship.

Additionally, LauncherOne's unique capabilities as an air-launched rocket potentially unlock the opportunity to conduct orbital launches from Italian soil. In the coming months, SITAEL and Virgin Orbit will complete a study of the technical and regulatory feasibility of such missions, which would be the first ever flights to space from Italy and will include significant technological and industrial contributions from SITAEL.

Representatives of the Italian Government and Puglia Region, together with leadership from the U.S. Embassy in Rome, were present to show their support for the plan, highlighting the strategic relevance of the project for both the U.S. and Italy.
....

Цитировать http://www.sitael.com/virgin-group-sitael-sign-agreements-long-term-collaboration-investment/

July 6, 2018 – Sir Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group, visited Mr. Vito Pertosa, founder of Angel Group, at Sitael headquarters in Mola di Bari, Puglia.

In this occasion Mr. Nicola Zaccheo – SITAEL CEO – , Mr. Dan Hart – Virgin Orbit CEO -, Mr. George Whitesides –Virgin Galactic CEO – and Mr. Vincenzo Giorgio – Altec CEO signed two important agreements at the presence of the Italian Minister Ms. Barbara Lezzi, the President of Puglia Region Mr. Michele Emiliano, the President of the Italian Space Agency Mr. Roberto Battiston, the President of the Aeroporti di Puglia Mr. Tiziano Onesti and the Commercial Officer of the U.S. Embassy in Rome Mr. Todd Avery.

SITAEL previously sel ected Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne rocket to launch μHETsat – the first full electric small satellite in the world-, in partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Italian Space Agency (ASI). The agreement signed today opens new important possibilities for avio-launches, in fact, in the coming months SITAEL and Virgin Orbit will complete the study of the technical and regulatory feasibility of such missions, which would be the first ever flights to space from Italy and will include significant technological and industrial contributions from SITAEL.

The other agreement signed with Altec and Virgin Galactic comes after two years of business discussions, government regulatory analysis and feasibility studies. In September 2016 Altec – a public-private company owned by the Italian Space Agency and Thales Alenia Space – signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Virgin Galactic. In August 2017 the U.S. Department of State approved a Technical Assistance Agreement for the development of a plan for ultimate construction of an Italian spaceport, that will provide the infrastructure for future Virgin Galactic suborbital flights.

In May 2018, following in-depth analysis of potential locations, the Italian Ministry of Infrastructures, Transportations and Space Programs together with the Italian Civil Aviation Authority (ENAC) designated the Taranto-Grottaglie Airport as the national spaceport for the Virgin Galactic activities.

The agreement signed today envisions a dedicated space vehicle system, built by Virgin Galactic's sister enterprise The Spaceship Company, being positioned at the future Grottaglie Spaceport, which will integrate significant technological and industrial contribution from Sitael, Altec and the rest of Italian Aerospace industry.

The two agreements are the first step of a collaboration on different industrial areas between the Angel Group and the Virgin Group, the presence of representatives of the Italian Government, the Puglia Region and the American Embassy in Rome confirms the strategic relevance of this project both for Italy and the United States of America.

....

Цитироватьhttps://www.asi.it/en/news/italian-space-agency-and-virgin-galactic-sign-a-joint-declaration-0
...
Today's joint declaration is following the Letter of Intent under which the Italian Space Agency and Virgin Galactic entered into negotiations to conduct a suborbital flight no earlier than September 2019. Although the first ASI Virgin Galactic partnership flight is scheduled to take place from Spaceport America in New Mexico, the opening of the new Italian spaceport in Puglia, in southern Italy, offers Virgin Galactic and ASI the ability to conduct sustained operations fr om the Taranto-Grottaglie airport. Last May, the Ministry of Infrastructures and Transport and ENAC (National Civil Aviation Authority) designated Grottaglie as the first Italian spaceport. ALTEC (company owned by ASI and Thales Alenia Space) and SITAEL have signed an agreement with Virgin Galactic to create an Italian Spaceship Company to operate fr om southern Italy. The new space infrastructure could also be the access route to space for other types of activities, beyond tourism, such as the launch of small satellites, astronaut training, microgravity science or testing for new technologies.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185874.jpg)Michael Baylor‏ @nextspaceflight (https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight) 14 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1017484907130437632)

Virgin Orbit's Cosmic Girl is currently performing a test flight over the Pacific Ocean – possibility in preparation for the captive carry test with LauncherOne. Map: https://flightaware.com/live/flight/N744VG ... (https://t.co/0y2SKPhUE5)

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12 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1017485322475560960)

The test starts in Long Beach and ends in Mojave. The Mojave Air and Space Port is where the 747-400 will perform the captive carry test. During the test, Cosmic Girl will drop the LauncherOne vehicle over Edwards Air Force Base airspace.

Цитировать https://spacenews.com/u-k-selects-scottish-spaceport-site/
U.K. selects Scottish spaceport site
by Jeff Foust (https://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — July 15, 2018
...
One of those potential launch sites is Cornwall Airport Newquay in southwestern England. Officials there announced late July 15 that they are entering into a partnership with Virgin Orbit that could allow that company's air-launched LauncherOne system to operate from the airport, dubbed Spaceport Cornwall.

That partnering agreement, to be signed at Farnborough July 16, would allow LauncherOne missions to fly from Spaceport Cornwall by 2021. A detailed plan to support such launches from the spaceport, including licensing of the airport as a spaceport, will be developed after the agreement is signed.

"The announcement of a strategic partnership between Virgin Orbit and Cornwall Spaceport is great news for the region and the U.K.'s ambitions for regular, reliable and responsible access to space," said U.K. Science Minister Sam Gyimah in a statement from Spaceport Cornwall. "This partnership could see Virgin Orbit's innovative horizontal launch technology helping the U.K.'s small satellite industry access space from the convenience of a Spaceport in Cornwall."

It wasn't clear from the announcement how committed Virgin Orbit is to launching from the United Kingdom. Virgin plans to begin launch operations as soon as later this summer from Mojave Air and Space Port in California, and is in discussions about additional launch sites on the U.S. East Coast and in the Pacific. On July 6, Virgin Orbit announced a memorandum of understanding with the Italian company Sitael that could lead to LauncherOne missions from Taranto-Grottaglie Airport in southern Italy (https://spacenews.com/virgin-space-companies-sign-new-agreements-with-italy/), although the agreement didn't set a timetable for such missions.
...

Цитироватьhttp://www.spaceportcornwall.com/pdfs/satellite-launches-set-to-return-to-British-soil-after-50-years.pdf

Virgin Orbit, a satellite launch company, has sel ected Spaceport Cornwall as an
ideal location to operate and deliver one of the first launches of its LauncherOne
system outside of its US home.
...
Virgin Orbit is seeking to provide launches fr om a Spaceport at Cornwall Airport
Newquay by 2021, using a modified Boeing 747-400 aircraft called "Cosmic Girl".
Cosmic Girl will carry a LauncherOne rocket under its wing to a launch range
over the Atlantic and release the rocket at around 35,000 feet for onward flight
into space, carrying a satellite into Earth orbit.
...
Virgin Orbit will today (16 July 2018) sign the partnering agreement with
Cornwall Council at Farnborough International Airshow. Work will now
commence to develop a detailed plan for launch by 2021 as well as a Spaceport
and Operator Licence application.
The signing of this agreement is the culmination of over a year's work by a team
led and funded by the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Local Enterprise Partnership
(LEP), in partnership with Cornwall Council.
Following Virgin Orbit's commitment, Cornwall Council will consider resources to
progress the project at a meeting of its Cabinet on a date to be confirmed.
Spaceport Cornwall could eventually create 480 jobs and contribute £25 million
a year to the local economy. The LEP's Space Action Plan predicts that the wider
space sector could create thousands more jobs in Cornwall and by 2030 be
worth £1 billion a year.
....

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 13 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1024758119967215616)

Virgin Galactic's Todd Ericson is talking about the company's "north star" culture of safety that allows it to take "prudent" risks without endangering the uninvolved public.

12 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1024758372615249936)

Ericson: although Newsweek emphatically reported us flying at twice the speed of light, we instead flew about Mach 2.5. Our propulsion team isn't that good yet.

10 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1024758739906248705)

Ericson: we mated LauncherOne pylon to Virgin Orbit's 747 last week; first captive carry test flight in the next week.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 20 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1024992653459562497)

Clarification: the upcoming flight is an "envelope expansion" flight of just the 747 and its new pylon, rather than a full-fledged captive carry flight with a LauncherOne vehicle attached.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 14 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1034552200259751936)

The pylon is on, baby. #GirlsWhoLift (https://twitter.com/hashtag/GirlsWhoLift?src=hash) This critical mechanism keeps #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) attached securely to Cosmic Girl's wing as she makes her way skyward.

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Спойлер

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[свернуть]

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit nears first test flights with air-launched rocket
August 31, 2018 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/08/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

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Virgin Orbit's carrier aircraft, named "Cosmic Girl," flies with a newly-installed rocket pylon under its left wing. Credit: Virgin Orbit

The attachment of a mounting bracket for Virgin Orbit's smallsat launcher under the wing of a modified passenger jetliner portends the start of a series of captive carry tests with a full-scale model of the rocket, culminating in a drop of the vehicle before the first orbital launch attempt.

Virgin Orbit is developing the LauncherOne rocket, which is set to become the first liquid-fueled orbital-class rocket to be dropped fr om fr om a carrier aircraft. The company says the first launch could happen by the end of this year, but officials have not set a target date for LauncherOne's maiden orbital test flight.

But the addition of a new pylon under the left wing of Virgin Orbit's Boeing 747 carrier jet, named "Cosmic Girl," signals testing of the LauncherOne system is about to enter a new phase, beginning with a series of captive-carry flights of an inert launch vehicle.

On operational missions, Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne rocket will be dropped from the Boeing 747 jumbo jet over the ocean before igniting its main engine and climbing into orbit. The two-stage rocket, fueled by kerosene and liquid oxygen, stretches around 70 feet (21 meters) long and uses parts primarily developed and manufactured in-house at Virgin Orbit's Long Beach headquarters.

Спойлер

A spinoff of Branson's Virgin Galactic, which aims to fly space tourists on suborbital trips to the edge of space, Virgin Orbit is one of many commercial companies working on smallsat launchers. One competitor, Rocket Lab, has already flown its Electron smallsat launcher twice, and others are close behind.

LauncherOne is one of the few air-launched rockets of the group, and the closest new air-dropped launcher to being flight-ready. Virgin Orbit says it sells the booster to customers for around $12 million per mission, delivering up to 1,100 pounds (500 kilograms) of payload hardware to a low-altitude equatorial orbit, or up to 661 pounds (300 kilograms) to a 310-mile-high (500-kilometer) sun-synchronous polar orbit.

Dan Hart, Virgin Orbit's president and CEO, said the LauncherOne system is positioned to snag a significant share of the smallsat launch market. The company has more than $400 million in its backlog of launch contracts, covering dozens of missions for OneWeb — which is developing a constellation of 900 small communications satellites — NASA, the U.S. military and other commercial CubeSat and smallsat owners.

"There are a lot of people with concepts of launchers," Hart said in an interview with Spaceflight Now earlier this year. "There are a lot less teams with a significant amount of hardware and going to flight. That's No. 1. We are a well-supported company that is not only not doing an experiment, but actually has a production facility here in Long Beach developing rockets. So that differentiates us further."

A study last year released by Euroconsult reported more than 6,200 smallsats — spacecraft weighing up to 1,100 pounds (500 kilograms) — are expected to be launched over the next decade, representing a market value of around $30 billion. Companies developing new light-class launchers say they will provide smallsats with a lower-cost launch option than existing rockets, which are sized to either carry up heavier payloads or bundle numerous microsats and CubeSats together on a single flight.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/144831.jpg)
A test model of Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne rolls out of the company's Long Beach factory earlier this year. Credit: Virgin Orbit

CubeSats have also been deployed from the International Space Station. While that alternative carries an attractive price for smallsat owners, it limits payloads to a single type of orbit roughly 250 miles (400 kilometers) above Earth, inclined 51.6 degrees to the equator.

To make the smallsat economy more vibrant, companies need to be able to put their satellites in a range of orbits. Analysts say that day will come when dedicated light launchers come to market.

"There's a lot of pent-up need," Hart said. "There's a lot of thirst for launch, and we'll have a bright future."

Virgin Orbit builds more than 90 percent of LauncherOne at its plant adjacent to Long Beach Airport, according to Will Pomerantz, vice president of special projects at the company. That vertical integration, coupled with an emphasis on simplicity and 3D printing, will make LauncherOne viable in the competitive commercial smallsat launch market, company officials said.

The air-launched concept also makes Virgin Orbit capable of putting up satellites into different types of orbits, ranging from polar to equatorial inclinations. LauncherOne's first test flight will follow a southerly heading over the Pacific Ocean off of Southern California, following takeoff from Mojave Air and Space Port.

Future missions, beginning with a multi-satellite launch for the U.S. military's Space Test Program next year, will be staged from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and Virgin Orbit last month announced plans to base missions out of Cornwall Airport Newquay in southwest England.

The company says it is also assessing launch operations at Ellison Onizuka Kona International Airport in Hawaii and the former Roosevelt Roads Naval Station in Puerto Rico.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/144809.jpg)
Artist's illustration of LauncherOne underneath Virgin Orbit's "Cosmic Girl" carrier jet. Credit: Virgin Orbit

"Commercial is really leading the charge in small satellites," said Hart, a former Boeing executive and a veteran of the Delta launch team. "Government has gotten involved, which is great to see.

"I think we're seeing more momentum building as the government is coming to a realization that there are all these platforms and launch systems that are becoming available to them, which is a very different model than we saw some 40 years ago, wh ere government really plowed the path, developed the technology, and eventually commercial launch started to come about in the '80s and early '90s," Hart said. "This is really very strongly driven by commercial entrepreneurs, and a fair amount of investment that's coming in, which puts the government community in a great position."

Buoyed by hundreds of millions of dollars from Branson and Abu Dhabi's Aabar Investments, Virgin Orbit has started up a factory adjacent to Long Beach Airport, built test stands near Mojave — home to Virgin Galactic — and now has parts of multiple rockets under construction.

Virgin Orbit's relationship with Branson also allowed the burgeoning launch company to acquire LauncherOne's carrier aircraft from Virgin Atlantic. Ground crews have stripped around 30 tons of weight and passenger seats from the airplane to allow it to haul LauncherOne — which weighs 57,000 pounds (nearly 26 metric tons) fully fueled — to an altitude of 35,000 feet (10.7 kilometers) to begin its journey into orbit.

LauncherOne is designed as an expendable rocket, but Virgin Orbit views the carrier plane mothership as part of the overall launch system. The air-dropped satellite launcher concept has its roots in Virgin Galactic, which at first considered lofting the rocket under the WhiteKnightTwo carrier jet used by the SpaceShipTwo suborbital rocket plane.

"If you look at wh ere we are right now, No. 1, we have the most reusable initial stage that anybody has ever thought of having, a Boeing 747, which has been the workhorse in aeronautics for ages now," Hart said. "That's point No. 1 — very reusable and very flexible. We're on an operational cadence driven by a 747, not a launch pad.

"No. 2, our focus has been to drive the cost down through advanced manufacturing," he said. "It's to make as simple of a rocket as possible driven by manufacturing. It'll be a horse race a little bit over what kinds of reusability approaches come about, and how we innovate and what kind of manufacturing innovations we find, and we're always going to pick the most efficient way to operate for our customers."

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/144848.jpg)
Three hook interfaces will connect LauncherOne to the pylon under "Cosmic Girl's" left wing. Credit: Virgin Orbit

Simplicity is key to Virgin Orbit's ethos.

"We're not trying to build the biggest rocket, the highest-thrust rocket, the fastest rocket," said Will Pomerantz, Virgin Orbit's vice president of special projects, as Spaceflight Now toured the company's Long Beach factory in May. "We're trying to build the most affordable and reliable rocket that we think is commercially viable in the long run."

Virgin Orbit's engineers devised a rocket made entirely of carbon composite structures, using a single engine on its first stage and another engine, similar to the booster's powerplant, on the upper stage.

The NewtonThree engine on the first stage will generate 73,500 pounds of thrust in vacuum, firing for around three minutes on each mission. The second stage's NewtonFour engine will ramp up to 5,000 pounds of thrust, and can be reignited in space to maneuver into different orbits.

Both engines have been test-fired for years, and the finish line in the NewtonThree and NewtonFour development campaign is in sight for Virgin Orbit.

One major piece of the rocket Virgin Orbit outsourced was the engine turbopumps, which are produced by Barber-Nichols, the same company that designed the turbopump for SpaceX's Merlin rocket engine.

"The engines were the first part of the program that we started, well before we were thinking about avionics and tanks," Pomerantz said.

Virgin Orbit says it can build 24 rockets per year out of the Long Beach plant, thanks to new manufacturing techniques made possible with 3D printing. A massive hybrid manufacturing tool the size of a truck produces full-scale thrust chambers for the NewtonThree engine.

Parts manufactured by the hybrid tool, which can churn out components using 3D printing or with traditional "subtractive" processes, have been proven on Virgin Orbit's test stands in the Mojave Desert.

"Right now, to manufacture a NewtonThree engine using traditional subtractive manufacturing is about 10 months," Pomerantz said. "We'd like to build 24 rockets per year. You can do that with one part that takes 10 months, but it's not ideal. You'd have to build a bunch of them parallel. You'd have to start in advance. There are cash flow implications to that. There are risk implications to that."

New machining techniques could cut the time to build a rocket engine from 10 months to a few weeks, according to Pomerantz. Engineers can enter specifications for a part, and let the machine's computer do the rest.

"This is one of the big revolutions," Pomerantz said. "In my opinion, 3D printing has not yet made a very major impact on aerospace. A lot of people have (made) a bracket or widget or something modest, but nobody has flown a critical system yet."

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/144843.jpg)
Artist's concept of Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne system. Credit: Virgin Orbit

In a separate part of the factory in Long Beach, engineers examine circuit boards that will go into computers responsible for overseeing the performance of LauncherOne's engines, separation systems, destruct mechanism, and other vital functions.

Miniaturization is the mantra here.

Like any rocket, LauncherOne will need avionics and computers to safely, and automatically, guide it into orbit.

"It's the same number of boards everyone else would have, but every time we shrink a big box from desktop computer-sized to the size of an iPad, that's 10 pounds that we're saving," Pomerantz said. "That starts to add up on a smaller vehicle."

Pomerantz said Virgin Orbit has drawn on engineering talent from computer companies to marry that know-how with the aerospace industry.

"If you're looking for companies who have spent a lot making computers miniaturized ... it's Samsung, it's Apple," he said.

LauncherOne will use an autonomous safety system, which would be activated to terminate a mission if it flew off course. SpaceX is already flying such a destruct mechanism on its Falcon family of rockets, eliminating the need for a range safety officer to send a flight termination command.

That streamlines LauncherOne's range requirements, permitting it to fly from a barebones spaceport.

"That's what allows us to fully take advantage of the flexibility that comes with the airplane," Pomerantz said. "We have found that one of our main selling points for our customers is the flexibility to launch from a variety of locations to hit different inclinations and orbital parameters. So it's nice to say we can fly from Mojave today, or from the SLF (Kennedy Space Center's Shuttle Landing Facility) tomorrow, and from other places.

"If we have to go spend a couple of years working on FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) licensing, then that's just a hollow talking point. We'd like for that to be very real."

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/144869.jpg)
Virgin Orbit president and CEO Dan Hart (right) leads GomSpace CEO Niels Buus on a tour in Long Beach. Credit: Virgin Orbit

LauncherOne will employ a similar air-launch concept as Northrop Grumman's Pegasus rocket, which first flew in 1990. Pegasus rockets, originally developed by Orbital Sciences, have launched on 43 orbital missions to date, with the 44th Pegasus flight carrying a satellite scheduled in early October.

But a Pegasus mission is priced at more than $50 million — out of reach for commercial smallsat owners — and NASA has been the only Pegasus customer in recent years.

"Pegasus was a very innovative system," Hart said. "It definitely plowed ground that was very valuable for the whole industry. It arrived at a time that was probably a little early for the kind of capability that small satellites can bring forward. Now, it's a different era."

LauncherOne will soon take to the skies for the first time, beginning with a series of captive-carry tests of an atmospheric test vehicle under Cosmic Girl's wing.

Since the installation of the pylon, the rocket's carrier plane has conducted several flights out of Southern California Logistics Airport in Victorville, California, according to online aircraft tracking websites.

Virgin Orbit's pilots, led by Kelly Latimer, will practice flying the 747 jumbo jet with the rocket on-board, checking out the airplane's aerodynamic and handling qualities. Latimer is a former Air Force combat pilot, and she later served as a test pilot for NASA and Boeing before joining Virgin.

The captive-carry testing will culminate in a drop of the LauncherOne test rocket, filled with water instead of propellant to simulate the weight of a fully-fueled booster. Latimer's flying team and a network of instrumentation will evaluate the airplane's response to the rocket's release, and sensors aboard the test booster will collect data as it free falls back to Earth.

Hart said flight testing with LauncherOne's mothership and the completion of engine testing were two of his top priorities. The drop test will be a major step leading to the rocket's inaugural orbital launch, he said.

"That's the final verification that all the forces and the aerodynamics are well understood."

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1039415137277562880)

At #WSBW (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBW?src=hash) this morning, Virgin Orbit's Dan Hart provided an overview of the company's launch system, although no major announcements. "We're in full scale integrated checkout right now."

10 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1039421481258770433)

Hart notes the proliferation of small launch ventures and associated artists' renditions of them: the industry is probably hiring as many artists as engineers right now.
#WSBW (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBW?src=hash)

10 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1039421935409618944)

Hart, asked about last year's announcement of a planned Saudi investment in Virgin space companies: discussions still ongoing; we're focused on getting first flight later this year.
#WSBW (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBW?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1039927944863395840)

Our fearless leader has been off at #WSBW (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBW?src=hash) talking the talk with our customers and other industry leaders. Back here at Rocket Factory HQ, we're walking the walk with a factory floor that's more crowded than ever. https://spacenews.com/shakeout-looming-for-the-small-launch-sector/ ... (https://t.co/W2LJdCecn4)

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ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - 2018 Highlights (So Far)

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 1 окт. 2018 г.

We predicted 2018 would be even more fun and challenging than last year, and we were absolutely right. From engine hot-fires to crewed flight tests, check out everything we've accomplished this year so far on our journey to LauncherOne's first orbital flight.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 21 окт. (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1053818402597269504)

TFW you're conducting a test flight of your airborne rocket launch pad and one of the nation's biggest air shows happens to be right next door. Thanks having #CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash) as a surprise guest, @HBairshow (https://twitter.com/HBairshow)!

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Спойлер

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186319.jpg)Pauline Acalin‏ @w00ki33 (https://twitter.com/w00ki33) 20 окт. (https://twitter.com/w00ki33/status/1053781069034545152)

Cosmic Girl exposed her underbelly today at #greatpacificairshow2018 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/greatpacificairshow2018?src=hash) revealing a perfect view of the pylon under her left wing. It's going to be insane to see a rocket attached to that thing. @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) @Teslarati (https://twitter.com/Teslarati)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 8 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1055112315081617408)

#CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash), meet #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash). LauncherOne, meet Cosmic Girl. We think you'll be friends! We're conducting some fit checks now with our dedicated smallsat launch vehicle and our 747 flying launch pad. It's a beautiful day here in Long Beach!

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 24 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1055218216690012160)

You've seen photos of our rocket. You've flown on 747s. But it's hard to fully appreciate the scale of our flexible, affordable satellite launch system until you see our vehicles together! For the first time, here are images of #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) under the wing of #CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash) – Virgin Orbit (https://twitter.com/search?q=place%3A0c81ee106d95a000)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186319.jpg)Pauline Acalin‏ @w00ki33 (https://twitter.com/w00ki33) 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/w00ki33/status/1055216283187204096)

Launcher One is looking pretty badass after being rolled into position under Cosmic Girl's pylon. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png) #virginorbit (https://twitter.com/hashtag/virginorbit?src=hash) #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1055298583442800640)

Capping off a great day of firsts, we mated our #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) rocket to #CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash), our customized 747, as the sun set over the beautiful @LBAirport (https://twitter.com/LBAirport). An excellent way to cap off a smooth and successful day! – Virgin Orbit (https://twitter.com/search?q=place%3A0c81ee106d95a000)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186164.jpg)A.C. Charania‏ @ac_charania (https://twitter.com/ac_charania) 16:05 (https://twitter.com/ac_charania/status/1064308636606844928) - 18 нояб. 2018 г.

Flight track and altitude/speed plot of today's flight test (OBT01) of @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) LauncherOne 747-400 carrier aircraft #CosmicGirl (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CosmicGirl?src=hash) with pylon attached as well as rocket test article (photo via @zia_aero (https://twitter.com/zia_aero) and figures via @flightaware (https://twitter.com/flightaware))

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/172474.jpg)

Спойлер

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Цитировать(https://scontent-arn2-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/ddd336316c4f8da8fde1626da8d347b8/5C945C5E/t51.2885-19/s150x150/19367489_405704293159086_8704241598940053504_a.jpg) richardbranson (https://www.instagram.com/richardbranson/)

richardbranson (https://www.instagram.com/richardbranson/) Incredible progress for @virgin.orbit (https://www.instagram.com/virgin.orbit/)'s 'flying launchpad': delighted to share that Cosmic Girl has completed a successful test flight with a rocket tucked under its wing for the first time

https://scontent-frx5-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/c3cae1399db99a649d2c624286967b1c/5BFBA82E/t50.2886-16/46160601_946950598834784_6547069080245895168_n.mp4 (https://scontent-frx5-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/c3cae1399db99a649d2c624286967b1c/5BFBA82E/t50.2886-16/46160601_946950598834784_6547069080245895168_n.mp4) (0:59 (https://scontent-frx5-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/c3cae1399db99a649d2c624286967b1c/5BFBA82E/t50.2886-16/46160601_946950598834784_6547069080245895168_n.mp4))

3 ДНЕЙ НАЗАД (https://www.instagram.com/p/BqXUx2LhnG4/)

Цитировать19 November 2018

Virgin Orbit completes successful captive carry test flight with 'flying launchpad'

Virgin Orbit (https://virginorbit.com/)'s Cosmic Girl has taken to the skies with a rocket tucked under its wing for the first time. The specially modified 747-400 carrying a 70-foot-long rocket under its wing soared through the air as part of a successful test flight for Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne.

The flawless test flight took place in the cloudless skies over Southern California, with the small satellite launch company proving that its carbon-fiber two-stage rocket works perfectly as a pair with Cosmic Girl, the customised former passenger aircraft that serves as the company's 'flying launch pad.' The successful test puts more air under the wings - and fins - of the company's plans to reach orbit in early 2019.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/189258.webp)
Image credit: Virgin Orbit

The test, which Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart described as "a picture-perfect flight, and big step forward for our program," took place in Victorville, California - a test facility close both to Virgin Orbit's Long Beach factory and to one of its operational launch sites, the Mojave Air and Space Port.

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"The vehicles flew like a dream today," said Virgin Orbit Chief Pilot Kelly Latimer (Lt. Col, US Air Force, Ret.) "Everyone on the flight crew and all of our colleagues on the ground were extremely happy with the data we saw from the instruments on-board the aircraft, in the pylon, and on the rocket itself. From my perspective in the cockpit, the vehicles handled incredibly well, and perfectly matched what we've trained for in the simulators."

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/189257.webp)
Image credit: Virgin Orbit

This successful flight marks the start of a new phase in Virgin Orbit's extensive test flight campaign. As part of that program, the company will conduct several more flights of its 747-400, some with a LauncherOne rocket attached and some without; each of which will allow the launch provider to gather critical data to further prove out the vehicle pair. With mountains of data already collected about the smooth handling of the system, future tests will focus on further proving out the robustness of the company's novel pylon, the carbon-fiber rocket itself, and the performance of the cutting-edge, light-weight avionics and flight computers on board the rocket. This portion of the years-long testing regime will conclude with a drop test, during which a rocket will be released from Cosmic Girl - without igniting - generating priceless data about Cosmic Girl's pylon and the rocket's behaviour as it freefalls through the atmosphere.

This flight is the latest in a string of major steps forward for Virgin Orbit. The rocket was first mated to the rocket in late October, and high-speed taxi tests were conducted only a week prior to this test flight. On the strength of that steady progress, Virgin Orbit projects its first space shot to be completed in early 2019. The launch provider expects to conduct multiple trips to orbit in the year ahead, and has already begun to build, test and integrate the rockets for those subsequent missions at its manufacturing facility in Long Beach, California.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/189256.webp)
Image credit: Virgin Orbit

Dan Hart capped the day by saying, "I'm extremely proud of Kelly, the flight crew, and all of our hard-working team. Their professionalism really shone through today, with our rocket and our plane up in the skies on a beautiful California day. There's still important work to do, but I know our team and our customers were all thrilled to see us taking this important step forward."

Head over to Richard's blog (https://www.virgin.com/richard-branson/cosmic-girl-takes-skies-rocket-under-its-wing) to read his views on the test flight, and Virgin Orbit to find out more.

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Цитировать19 November 2018

Cosmic Girl takes to the skies with a rocket under its wing

By Richard Branson (https://www.virgin.com/person/richard-branson)
19 November 2018
@richardbranson (https://twitter.com/richardbranson)

If our 747 could talk, it would probably say "What on Earth is that hanging from my wing?" Delighted to share that Virgin Orbit (https://virginorbit.com/)'s Cosmic Girl has completed a successful test flight with a rocket tucked under its wing for the first time.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/189260.webp)
Image from Virgin Orbit

The captive carry test flight saw the specially modified 747-400 carrying a 70-foot-long rocket under its wing in the skies over Southern California. It marks the first time a 747 has carried a rocket, let alone a space rocket, in its 70 year history and is a big step forward for the company as we look forward to reaching orbit in early 2019.

Спойлер

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/189259.webp)
Image from Virgin Orbit

Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart and the team are doing an incredible job moving Virgin Orbit forward with remarkable skill and perseverance, and all of the Virgin family were so proud to see Cosmic Girl completing this milestone test with flying colours. Amazingly, the team went from our first taxi test to our first captive carry flight in a week!

I've been fortunate enough to spend time with the team on several occasions recently and see first-hand the progress being made. There are many challenges to overcome ahead, but the excellent data and performance in all aspects of this latest test flight is really encouraging. I'm looking forward to our first space shot in early 2019 and multiple trips to orbit in the year ahead.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/189255.webp)
Image from Virgin Orbit

Together with Virgin Galactic (https://www.virgingalactic.com/)'s strong progress in our testing program, 2019 is shaping up to be a huge year for our space companies. Head over to Virgin Orbit to read more of the details on the successful captive carry test flight and follow the latest news from our small satellite business.

https://scontent-frx5-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/c3cae1399db99a649d2c624286967b1c/5BFBA82E/t50.2886-16/46160601_946950598834784_6547069080245895168_n.mp4 (https://scontent-frx5-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/c3cae1399db99a649d2c624286967b1c/5BFBA82E/t50.2886-16/46160601_946950598834784_6547069080245895168_n.mp4)

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ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - First Taxi Tests

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 13 нояб. 2018 г.

Zoom, zoom, zoom, #LauncherOne (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%23LauncherOne) was on the move again — this time for our very first high-speed taxi test. With chief pilot Kelly Latimer at the helm, Cosmic Girl cruised down the runway at Victorville Airport this weekend with a rocket under her wing. Not only did we ramp all the way up to more than 110 knots (that'll blow your hair back!), we also used the day as an opportunity to load real flight software onto #LauncherOne (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%23LauncherOne) for the first time.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - First Captive Carry Flight

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 19 нояб. 2018 г.

On November 18th, 2018, a new sight appeared in the baby-blue skies over Southern California: A specially modified 747-400 carrying a 70-foot-long rocket under its wing soared through the air as part of a successful test flight for Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne. Sir Richard Branson's small satellite launch company completed a flawless test flight, proving that its carbon-fiber two-stage rocket works perfectly as a pair with Cosmic Girl, the customized former passenger aircraft that serves as the company's "flying launch pad." The successful test puts more air under the wings—and fins—of the company's plans to reach orbit in early 2019.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1069728360845074433)

Just 2 weeks after #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) left the ground for the 1st time, we were back in the air again yesterday—this time higher, better, faster (and cooler). Overall, our pilots and engineers agreed the 2nd leg of our captive carry campaign was a major success. On to the next one. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125615.png)

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Спойлер

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ЦитироватьVenture Class Rockets: First Class Flights for CubeSats

NASAKennedy (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjJtr2fFcUp6yljzJOzpHUg)

Опубликовано: 3 дек. 2018 г.

For years, tiny CubeSat satellites could only fly into space as hitchhikers, riding along with larger, primary payloads. Now, thanks to Venture Class Launch Services, these small packages of big science are getting their own rides into space on dedicated rockets -- and on their own terms. Rocket Lab USA of Huntington Beach, California, and Virgin Orbit of Long Beach, California, are the two companies poised to propel CubeSats from coach class to first class.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 15:05 (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1072266103710072833) - 10 дек. 2018 г.

#LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) was airborne again on Saturday — this time for a demo of our launch release maneuver. This is a tightly choreographed dance in the cockpit, where our pilots pull Cosmic Girl into a steep climb, giving our rocket just the right angle for an efficient path to space.

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67521.jpg)Stephen Clark‏ @StephenClark1 (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1) 9:32 (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/1073994287841468417) - 15 дек. 2018 г.

Some recent news: Rocket Lab's Electron & Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne are now listed as vehicles available for NASA's new small and medium-class Explorer missions of opportunity. That gives those missions, ranging from CubeSats up to microsatellites, a new dedicated launch option.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67530.jpg)Spaceflight Now‏ @SpaceflightNow (https://twitter.com/SpaceflightNow) 9:27 (https://twitter.com/SpaceflightNow/status/1073992883290685441) - 15 дек. 2018 г.

NASA is gearing up its first Electron launch with Rocket Lab this weekend, as the US space agency has recently added the Electron & Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne vehicles to a catalog of rockets available for future NASA CubeSat and smallsat missions. Story: https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/12/12/rocket-lab-preps-to-launch-flock-of-nasa-funded-cubesats/ ... (https://t.co/N2SrrJ7EuI)

ЦитироватьDecember 16, 2018

...
NASA also awarded Venture Class Launch Services contracts in 2015 to Firefly Space Systems and Virgin Galactic. ...

Virgin Orbit, the company spun off from Virgin Galactic to develop and operate the LauncherOne air-launch system, is nearing its first launch. The NASA contract will be flown on the second LauncherOne flight, on a mission called ELaNa-20 scheduled no earlier than March 2019. That mission will carry 11 cubesats for universities and NASA's Ames Research Center.
...

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - 2018 Highlights

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 21 дек. 2018 г.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1076199801413283840)

Just completed the last hotfire of the NewtonThree engine we'll use to fly to space next year! Demonstrating full thrust, gimbal and throttle range of this piece of flight hardware is the perfect way to close a year of incredible progress for our team. Here's raw footage:

Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1076199801413283840) (1:05)

ЦитироватьLauncherOne Hotfire — Final Acceptance Test for NewtonThree

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 26 дек. 2018 г.

We just completed the last hotfire of the NewtonThree rocket engine we'll use for our first orbital test flight (yep, this one's going to space!). This hotfire, filmed on December 19, 2018, demonstrated the full thrust, full gimbal range, and full throttling range of this piece of flight hardware in a smooth and stable burn — the perfect way to close out an incredible year of progress for our team.

Just two engines power our LauncherOne rocket: The NewtonThree on the main stage, and the NewtonFour on the upper stage. Have you seen our NewtonThree full duration hotfire test? If not, check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYVdd... (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYVddR3GLi8)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 11:40 PDT (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1107713439206563840) - 18 мар. 2019 г.

LauncherOne's first stage lit up our Mojave test site on Friday for the first hot-fire in our final series of full-scale, integrated system tests.

https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/D19iKfoUcAElTeB.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/D19iKfoUcAElTeB.mp4)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) ретвитнул(а)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186179.jpg)VOX Space‏ @TheRealVOXSpace (https://twitter.com/TheRealVOXSpace) 11 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/TheRealVOXSpace/status/1116075610692919296)

We're proud that #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) has qualified as a contender in the @DARPA (https://twitter.com/DARPA) Launch Challenge. Responsive launch capabilities are key to advancing our nation's space architecture. We love how systems like ours (and our customers!) are shifting the US government's approach to launch.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/160585.jpg)

ЦитироватьNEWS FROM SPACE SYMPOSIUM: DARPA Launch Challenge Moves Ahead With Three Competitors

4/10/2019 
By Stew Magnuson (http://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/authors/s/stew-magnuson)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/231674.jpg)
Vector Launch

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency chose three competitors for a challenge prize that will ask small launch providers to send payloads to orbit and rapidly turn around and repeat the feat.

Virgin Orbit's subsidiary VOX Space, Vector Launch and a third entrant that is choosing to remain anonymous for the time being are vying for more than $27 million in prize money, DARPA's Program Manager for the Launch Challenge Todd Master said during a briefing at the Space Symposium April 10.

Competitors will have 30 days to prepare for a launch from a site they may not be familiar with and integrate a payload with which they are also unfamiliar. They will then be asked to repeat the process from a second site within two weeks.

Each of the three contestants received $400,000 for making it into the final competition. Making it to the final three required the teams to obtain a Federal Aviation Administration launch license, which is a stringent process. The $400,000 is meant to offset the cost needed to obtain the FAA license, Master said.

None of the three teams have ever reached orbit. VOX Space will take off from a runway and employ Virgin Orbit's plane-launched system. The other two will use "horizontal" launch systems, Master said.

The teams will receive $2 million for the first successful launch. The first prize for those who can complete the second launch is $10 million, second place $9 million and third is $8 million.

DARPA is interested in demonstrating flexible launch systems and incentivizing industry, Master said.

"When we say 'flexible' we really mean the ability to launch from anywhere. When we say 'responsive' we mean the ability to launch on short notice," he said.

The teams have until January and February 2020 to prepare, after which they will be notified which FAA-certified launch facility they will be working from, Master said. The idea behind that and changing sites for the second launch is so no team has a "home field advantage," he added.

An industry day in May 2018 attracted 55 potential entrants. DARPA chose 30 entrants for the next phase, and eventually winnowed that down to 18. At that point, the entrants had to supply a lot more documentation and prove they had worked on hardware and software and had taken into account safety issues that would concern the FAA, Master said.

Цитировать

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196293.png) (https://virginorbit.com/)

VIRGIN ORBIT ADDS GUAM AS LOW INCLINATION LAUNCH SITE FOR LAUNCHERONE SMALLSAT LAUNCH SERVICE

APRIL 10, 2019

FEATURED (https://virginorbit.com/category/featured/)/PRESS RELEASES (https://virginorbit.com/category/press-releases/)

Long Beach, California — 10 April 2019 — Virgin Orbit, Sir Richard Branson's small satellite launch company, announced today that the Pacific island of Guam will become an additional launch site for the company's LauncherOne service. With its remote location and close proximity to the equator, Guam serves as an excellent base of operations fr om which the company's unique, 747-launched rocket can efficiently serve all inclinations, a boon to the rapidly expanding small satellite market. Most excitingly, the new location enables LauncherOne to deliver more than 450 kg to a 500 km equatorial orbit.

The addition of Guam to that list enhances the flexibility of Virgin Orbit's launch operations, adding a low-latitude site with clear launch trajectories in almost all directions, giving Virgin Orbit's customers unparalleled control over wh ere and when their small spacecraft are deployed.

Officials at US Pacific Air Forces (PACAF) have issued a letter of support for Andersen Air Force Base to host launches and other exercises with LauncherOne and its dedicated carrier aircraft—a critical step en route to a first launch from the island, which could occur in as little as a year's time. Additionally, the largest commercial airport on the island, A.B. Won Pat International Airport, has begun the process of seeking its launch site operator's license from the Federal Aviation Authority's (FAA) Office of Commercial Space Transportation, in order to serve as a future launch site for Virgin Orbit.

"Launching from Guam gives us easy access to every orbital inclination our customers need. With our air-launched system, we will fly out as any other airplane, move out to sea and release our rocket. Our minimal footprint coupled with Guam's natural launch location results in a great match. With the continued support from Governor Leon Guerrero and our partners in the DOD, we are well on our way towards providing new launch opportunities for small satellites that have waited too long for their ride to space, and we're thankful to the local government in Guam for their enthusiasm and support," said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart.

"This is a rare opportunity for our island to be front and center of a groundbreaking space industry," said Governor Lou Leon Guerrero. "Guam has always been a rare gem known for great weather, a beautiful landscape and warm people, and now we can add space transportation to that list."

Lieutenant Governor Joshua Tenorio adds, "We are keen to partner with Virgin Orbit to generate a new space industry in Guam and advance our local economy, as well as spur new STEM education opportunities for our youth to take us into the future."

In addition to the launch site's primary appeal to commercial missions, VOX Space also anticipates using Guam and other launch sites to provide responsive launch capability to the national security space community. As part of a series of Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs) with the Space and Missile Systems Center's Space Superiority Directorate located at Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo, CA, among others, VOX Space is developing concepts for how commercially developed space capabilities can partner with and complement the U.S. Department of Defense's existing mobility, transportation, and space launch systems

Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne system is now in the final phases of testing, after successfully demonstrating all major assemblies with multiple flight vehicles in production. Having just completed its fourth captive carry flight with a test rocket mated to the wing, Virgin Orbit is on track to conduct its first orbital test flight later this year.

By using a customized 747-400 aircraft as its "flying launch pad," Virgin Orbit gains the ability to quickly transport the entire launch site to new locations around the world, launching each satellite from the optimal location. This mobile approach to launch substantially reduces the expense required for infrastructure at each launch site. In addition to the Mojave Air and Space Port—the California launch site that will be home to the company's first orbital launch in the middle of this year, as well as subsequent launches to high inclination orbits—other spaceports both new and established have announced that they are working to prepare themselves for future missions of LauncherOne, including the Launch and Landing Facility at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Spaceport Cornwall in the United Kingdom, the Taranto-Grottaglie Airport in Italy, and others.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/184994.jpg)EXOLAUNCH‏ @EXOLAUNCH (https://twitter.com/EXOLAUNCH) 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/EXOLAUNCH/status/1116370433773907968)

Thrilled to announce that we have signed an MoU with @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) Via 'LauncherOne', we can let more of our customers access space simply, with advanced technical know-how. We welcome this partnership and can't wait for our first mission. The sky is no longer the limit!

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/160597.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 9 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1121557572228665344)

Another successful captive carry test flight in the books, our first from beautiful @MojaveAirport (https://twitter.com/MojaveAirport).

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161165.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161164.jpg)


9 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1121557658610200576)

This flight is a prequel to our own #endgame (https://twitter.com/hashtag/endgame?src=hash)(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125643.png) (https://twitter.com/hashtag/endgame?src=hash) — closing out our final stage hotfires and the last few flights in our captive carry test campaign, now with a fully loaded rocket underwing. After that, a drop test, and then it's show time for our first flight to orbit!

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 7 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1122898521772814337)

During a recent integration exercise, we verified that in addition to our already vetted order of operations, we are *also* able to mate the payload fairing to LauncherOne while the rocket is attached to Cosmic Girl's wing. So why is this important?

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161306.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161305.jpg)


7 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1122898615167356939)

Well, we've now demonstrated that we can have LauncherOne mated and ready to go even if we need access to the satellite until shortly before launch. Proving out this additional baseline of operations grants us greater flexibility and responsiveness to meet our customers' needs.


6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1122898799175688192)

Check out our website to learn more about the payload integration process and follow a satellite from its arrival in Long Beach to launch: https://virginorbit.com/launch/  (https://t.co/oNqiQVJGre)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161307.jpg)(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161308.jpg)(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161309.jpg)

ЦитироватьOn board Virgin Orbit's flying launchpad

Verge Science (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtxJFU9DgUhfr2J2bveCHkQ)

Опубликовано: 30 апр. 2019 г.

Richard Branson's Virgin Orbit is taking an unusual approach to putting satellites in space: the company wants to launch them in midair off the wing of a Boeing 747. We toured the prototype jet that'll send the first satellites into space, and asked Virgin Orbit's pilot what it's like to fly a jumbo jet with a rocket strapped to it.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 8 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1128750440160489473)

We've now kicked off the final phase of our test flight campaign, completing our 1st taxis with a heavy LauncherOne! As this test series progresses, we'll take to the skies again, flying higher & faster, before the drop test grand finale.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161473.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161474.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161475.jpg)


8 мин.назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1128750618703581184)

These taxi tests went really, really well. At 40, 70, and even 100 knots with a rejected takeoff, slosh and loads data were well within limits, and our chief test pilot reported Cosmic Girl handled like a dream. Onward and upward! (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125615.png)

ЦитироватьMAIN STAGE HOTFIRE: OUR BIGGEST TEST YET

MAY 21, 2019

In the rocket business, every test is an important opportunity to learn — but certain tests stand out. We're proud to announce that we completed perhaps the most challenging, most important, and most successful test in the history of our LauncherOne program: Last week, we lit up our Mojave site with our final full duration, full scale, full thrust – hell, full everything – test firing of LauncherOne's main stage. That's more than three minutes of controlled rocket thrust, using all of the same equipment we'll use on our actual flights to orbit later this year.

Here's one fun way to think about it: the data proved that if this stage wasn't physically bolted down, it had the oomph to make the journey into space.

The sheer complexity of this test means its success was a big deal for all hands involved. Its real significance, though, is that it signals the end of a major part of our program. Simply put, there are no "firsts" remaining for us on the ground. Every single part of the system — whether that's hardware, software, or processes — has now been demonstrated on our test stands.

Now, all that stands between us and our space shot is final assembly of our first orbital rocket and some key testing in the air with Cosmic Girl, building on the great flights we've already completed using a fully integrated-but-empty rocket. We've now loaded that rocket with fluid to simulate its weight when fully fueled — so stay tuned for updates as we progress through this final phase of our test flight campaign.

This isn't the end of the road, but we're proud to have completed some of the most difficult steps along the way. With just a handful of critical milestones to go, we're within arm's reach of our first orbital flight test, and we couldn't be more excited.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196294.jpg)

ЦитироватьLauncherOne Main Stage Mission Duty Cycle Hotfire

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 22 мая 2019 г.

We're proud to announce that we completed perhaps the most challenging, most important, and most successful test in the history of our LauncherOne program: Last week, we lit up our Mojave site with our final full duration, full scale, full thrust – hell, full everything – test firing of LauncherOne's main stage. That's more than three minutes of controlled rocket thrust, using all of the same equipment we'll use on our actual flights to orbit later this year.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1132052648809549824)

Our pilots and launch engineers are all smiles after another successful test flight, this one with a fully-loaded #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) rocket under the wing of our 'flying launch pad.' Here's a taste of the beautiful views today in the skies above @MojaveAirport (https://twitter.com/MojaveAirport)

Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1132052648809549824) (0:08)


(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/34298.jpg)Thomas Zurbuchen‏Подлинная учетная запись @Dr_ThomasZ (https://twitter.com/Dr_ThomasZ) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Dr_ThomasZ/status/1132056384474886144)

Great to read this - congrats! At NASA Science, and especially in @NASAEarth (https://twitter.com/NASAEarth) and @NASASun (https://twitter.com/NASASun), we see many great ideas that are implemented with payloads at this class of (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png) #SmallSats (https://twitter.com/hashtag/SmallSats?src=hash) #CubeSats (https://twitter.com/hashtag/CubeSats?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 16 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1133475964627824641)

Virgin red sure looks good against the blue backdrop of the Mojave skies! (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125483.png)
Here's a few more shots from Friday's heavy rocket flight test with Cosmic Girl.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161736.jpg)

Спойлер

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161737.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161738.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161739.jpg)

[свернуть]

ЦитироватьNASA, Virgin Orbit Test 3D Printed Rocket Engine Combustion Chamber

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYKfAzPEXMQsGtNfBCNa_BA)

Опубликовано: 29 мая 2019 г.

Engineers at Marshall Space Flight Center record the test-firing of a 3D-printed combustion chamber. Researchers are exploring advanced additive manufacturing solutions, introducing higher-performing alloys and refined printing processes. Read the full story here: https://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall... (https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=KWRyMYdz5LqJMIxxkDySftuGRjB8MTU1OTU4MzQwMUAxNTU5NDk3MDAx&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nasa.gov%2Fcenters%2Fmarshall%2Fnews%2Fnews%2Freleases%2F2019%2Fnasa-and-virgin-orbit-3d-print-test-rocket-combustion-chamber.html&v=sU3WI6IYW1Q). (NASA/Virgin Orbit)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 42 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1136616109321412608)

Mojave. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125286.png)
Guam. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125270.png)
The U.K. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125269.png)

Did you think we'd stop there?

Today, we're announcing a new partnership with @FlyANA_official (https://twitter.com/FlyANA_official) to bring our LauncherOne services to Japan. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125276.png)

Read more: https://virg.in/ANA  (https://t.co/PsfOs1DNKQ)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162084.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 7 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1136636617618350081)

Rich DalBello, Virgin Orbit: planning first LaunchOne launch in late summer or early fall.
#ISDC2019 (https://twitter.com/hashtag/ISDC2019?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1137134593444798465)

Ever wonder what #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) looks like from Cosmic Girl's perspective? Here's some more footage from our most recent captive carry flight test, featuring never-before-seen angles of our flying launchpad.

Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1137134593444798465) (1:00)


2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1137135162959917056)

This flight was all about pushing the limits of our carrier aircraft, testing for stall and high-G maneuvers. You catch an amazing view of the edge of space as our pilots soar through our launch release maneuver, pulling up to a 30° pitch attitude before banking right to recover.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/161917.jpg)


2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1137135236054102016)

Our pilots reported that Cosmic Girl and the fully loaded LauncherOne flew excellently throughout the flight, and passed inspection with no concerns after landing. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125615.png) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125615.png) On to the next one!

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1141754655770198016)

And we're off to the races again for another flight with a heavy rocket underwing! The big objective today is to make sure that we're ready for our upcoming drop test. Keep an eye out on our channels for more shots of our pilots practicing the drop maneuver with Cosmic Girl. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125615.png)

Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1141754655770198016)


49 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1141759337267752961)

It was an early start this morning for some of our staff, but it's always worth it to see this aircraft soar into the sunrise! A quick hello from @richardbranson (https://twitter.com/richardbranson) on comms does wonders for the spirits, too. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125600.png)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162258.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162261.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162260.jpg)

ЦитироватьСтарый пишет:
И что они надеются получить с этого Пегаса?

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 14 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1142173551014764545)

Call us romantics, but we've always been fascinated by the intersection of art and technology. So when our engineers requested some visual markers on LauncherOne's fins for testing, we figured we'd have our in-house artists make them visually stunning too!

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162301.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162300.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 14 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1143968823139360774)

Dan Hart, Virgin Orbit: launching this year; just finished guidance and navigation checkouts on the rocket yesterday.
#SpaceEntSummit (https://twitter.com/hashtag/SpaceEntSummit?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185727.jpg)Kevin Zagorski‏ @KevZag (https://twitter.com/KevZag) 1 июл. (https://twitter.com/KevZag/status/1145527641681776641)

LauncherOne Flight 1. Soon. (via @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit))

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/173715.jpg)

ЦитироватьUpcoming ELaNa CubeSat Launches

ELaNa XX

Mission:  Virgin Orbit Flight 2 LauncherOne – Mojave, California
11 CubeSat Missions scheduled to be deployed

[/li]
• CACTUS-1 – Capitol Technology University, Laurel, Maryland
• CAPE-3 – University of Louisiana Lafayette, Louisiana
• EXOCUBE-2 – California Polytechnic University, San Louis Obispo, California
• INCA – New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico
• MicroMas-2b – Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lexington, Massachusetts
• MiTEE – University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
• PICS – Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah
• PolarCube – University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, Colorado
• Q-PACE – University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida
• RadFXSat-2 – Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee
• TechEdSat-7 – NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett, California
  

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148708034249515008)

After another smooth test flight with Cosmic Girl yesterday, we've got the thumbs-up to advance to our drop test in the very near future. But why do we drop our rocket before we launch it — and what comes after? Check out our latest blog post for details: https://virg.in/WaitForTheDrop  (https://t.co/F3clhZ9eu4)

Спойлер

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/164499.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/164500.jpg)

[свернуть]

ЦитироватьWAIT FOR THE DROP
JULY 9, 2019

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196296.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196295.jpg)

If you live somewhere close to the Mojave high desert, it's quite likely in recent months that you've seen a plane soar overhead with flashy red livery and — yes — a 70-foot long rocket under its wing. In the run-up to our first space shot, Virgin Orbit has completed a steady progression of test flights with our carrier aircraft Cosmic Girl and LauncherOne vehicle — and yesterday, we successfully flew the last one in our captive carry test campaign.

That means we're now in the clear to progress to a drop test in the very near future. On this flight, we will release a fully built, fully loaded LauncherOne rocket from Cosmic Girl for the first time. We'll be monitoring and rehearsing a million things, but this test is really all about those few seconds just after release, as we ensure the rocket and aircraft separate cleanly and observe how the rocket freefalls through the air.

This upcoming drop test is a huge deal for our team. It represents the last major step of a development program we began in 2015, focused not just on designing a rocket but proving it out alongside the modified 747 that serves as our flying launchpad — not to mention simultaneously building out our manufacturing facility. It's impossible to quantify how much effort and joy and frustration and brainpower we've poured into this project, so you can imagine the sense of anticipation we feel as we look toward one of our significant milestones to date.

Cosmic Girl is ready, the test rocket is ready, the team is ready — and we'll be flying as soon as we can coordinate the airspace over Edwards Air Force Base. Stay tuned to our social media channels for updates on that flight, and on what comes next. Speaking of...

AFTER THE DROP

Strangely, no one ever asks us when our first launch is going to happen! Okay, well, that's not exactly true. We've gotten your emails, your Tweets, your LinkedIn messages, your Instastories, your TikToks, and that one MySpace message. And we're so excited that you'reso excited about our upcoming test launch. So we're pumped to tell you more about what comes next.

In our final progression to launch, we've been advancing on three parallel streams of work. We needed to go and test our rocket on the ground, proving that our engines, tanks, pumps, software, and everything else can all work together as integrated stages. Check! (https://virginorbit.com/main-stage-hotfire-our-biggest-test-yet/) We had to complete our flight test program (https://www.instagram.com/p/BybTdllh_z9/), and as you've just read, and we're nearly ready to check that box. Finally, we needed to build and prepare our first orbital rocket. Well, here's what that looks like now:

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196297.jpg)

As you can see, our first orbital rocket is fully built and has been extensively tested. Later this month, our integration team will wrap up that testing, mate the stages together, and then hand the rocket off to our launch operations team.

After that, our LaunchOps crew will run through the checks and rehearsals any serious rocket company does in the lead up to a flight. We've already fired our engines, separated our stages, and (pretty soon) taken off and released the rocket from the carrier aircraft. The last piece of the puzzle is combining it all into a seamless launch. Everything we do from here on out will be to demonstrate that the system can operate safely as a fully integrated whole — and that the people on our team have thought of and practiced everything they could ever need to do on launch day.

The LauncherOne story is just getting started. To stay in the loop as Virgin Orbit prepares for our first flight to space, follow us on Twitter (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/virginorbit/), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/virgin.orbit/?hl=en) and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/virgin-orbit/) — or sign up for our monthly newsletter (https://virginorbit.us14.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=024c85414431f25ca6edb2012&id=ed9357e7af), chock full of technical updates and small satellite news from around the world.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148982467941978112)

And we're off! (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125533.png) Cosmic Girl and #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) are wheels up at @MojaveAirport (https://twitter.com/MojaveAirport).

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166516.jpg)


2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148982888706166785)

Our flight crew, led by Chief Test Pilot Kelly Latimer, are now cruising out to our designated drop location above @EdwardsAFB (https://twitter.com/EdwardsAFB). If you've never met Kelly, get to know her in this great @latimes (https://twitter.com/latimes) profile by @smasunaga (https://twitter.com/smasunaga).

Цитироватьhttps://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-himi-kelly-latimer-virgin-orbit-pilot-20190620-story.html?hootPostID=2d6de67f94296bd9fb0816c9998da55d (https://t.co/TGVWkzRSna)

2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148986731640705024)

Cosmic Girl is now on the "racetrack" — a loop we run to get all lined up for the drop.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166591.jpg)


1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148988591407656960)

RELEASE RELEASE RELEASE! Flight crew onboard Cosmic Girl and our chase plane report good, clean separation. For the first time ever, #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) is flying freely. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125509.png)


1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148989969660166146)

Cosmic Girl is back to straight and level flight, and #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) looked fantastic in the air today.


52 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148997756993675264)

Dude, where's my rocket?

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166715.jpg)


52 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148997982169133058)

Mission complete! Thanks again to our friends @EdwardsAFB (https://twitter.com/EdwardsAFB) for hosting us today. We promise, we'll leave the base cleaner than we found it. Our ground crew are moving into position shortly. 

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 48 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1148999490109526016)

After today's awesome drop, our full attention shifts to this rocket right here. Like our latest blog mentions, we'll finish mating the stages together later this month before kicking off a final series of check-outs & rehearsals in the lead-up to our orbital test flight.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166744.jpg)


42 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1149000882064748544)

Oh, and by the way, we've already started work on the next rocket, and the one after that, and the one after that too. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png) END THREAD (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166761.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67521.jpg)Stephen Clark‏ @StephenClark1 (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1) 49 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/1149013518747873280)

Virgin Orbit's Dan Hart says his team is very happy after today's LauncherOne drop test. "This is our capstone event," he says. If everything goes well, he expects the first launch by the end of the summer.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 13 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1149024243503394816)

Now THAT's what I call a drop test! Video from today's very successful drop test of our #LauncherOne (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LauncherOne?src=hash) small satellite launch vehicle. More photos and videos coming soon.

Video (https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1149024243503394816)

Цитировать10 ИЮЛ, 23:01
Virgin Orbit испытала систему воздушного старта ракет для вывода спутников на орбиту

Испытания проводились в небе над пустыней Мохаве в Калифорнии

НЬЮ-ЙОРК, 10 июля. /ТАСС/. Компания Virgin Orbit британского миллиардера Ричарда Брэнсона в среду в небе над штатом Калифорния успешно испытала систему воздушного запуска ракет-носителей, предназначенных для вывода спутников на орбиту Земли. Об этом Virgin Orbit информировала в своем Twitter (https://twitter.com/virgin_orbit).

Испытания проводились во время полета модифицированного самолета Boeing 747, оборудованного системой сброса ракеты, в небе над пустыней Мохаве в Калифорнии. Сам боезаряд был холостым и, помимо металлических болванок, нес воду и антифриз для придания необходимой массы.

"Вот это мы называем настоящим тестом на сбрасывание. Испытание сброса небольшого носителя, предназначенного для запуска спутников, прошло очень успешно", - информировала Virgin Orbit, разместив также видео теста. Компания планирует до конца июля завершить сборку ракеты-носителя в ангаре в городе Лонг-Бич (штат Калифорния) и приступить к подготовке к первому испытательному запуску. Его предполагается осуществить до завершения лета.

Спойлер

Схожий принцип пусков использует другое предприятие Брэнсона - Virgin Galactic. В феврале текущего года эта компания провела испытательный суборбитальный запуск корабля SpaceShipTwo, который поднялся на высоту почти 90 км. На его борту находились пилоты Дейв Маккей и Майкл Мазуччи, а также руководитель группы подготовки персонала компании Бет Мосес.

Virgin Galactic осваивает суборбитальный туризм. Ожидается, что у этой компании стоимость двухчасового полета, во время которого шесть пассажиров смогут увидеть Землю с высоты 100 км, составит около $250 тыс. Планы регулярных туристических полетов в космос вынашивают также Blue Origin и SpaceX.

[свернуть]

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg)Virgin Orbit‏Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 10 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1149056179256954880)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125343.png) Now I'm freeeeee / free fallin' (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125343.png)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/167114.jpg)

ЦитироватьDrop test moves Virgin Orbit closer to first satellite launch
July 10, 2019 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2019/07/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/145636.jpg)
A full-scale mock-up of Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne rocket falls away fr om a modified Boeing 747 carrier jet Wednesday over the Mojave Desert of California. Credit: Virgin Orbit

A full-scale model of Virgin Orbit's air-dropped small satellite launcher, filled with water and antifreeze instead of rocket fuel, fell away from the wing of a modified Boeing 747 carrier jet Wednesday and impacted on a test range at Edwards Air Force Base in California, a key test that paves the way for the company's first space mission later this year.

Backed by billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson, Virgin Orbit aims to carve out a slice of the growing small satellite launch market alongside Rocket Lab and other companies.

Wednesday's drop test was the last major milestone in Virgin Orbit's test program, signaling the start of a transition from rocket development to launch operations, according to Dan Hart, the company's CEO.

"We have a very happy team up here in Mojave," Hart told Spaceflight Now after Wednesday's test. "The flight crew was just grins when they got off the airplane, and there are a lot of high-fives and hugs going on here."

Established in 2017 as a spinoff from Virgin Galactic, Branson's suborbital space tourism company, Virgin Orbit plans to base its early missions from Mojave Air and Space Port in California, then branch out to other airports. Future LauncherOne staging bases could be located at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Cornwall Airport Newquay in southwest England, Taranto-Grottaglie Airport in Italy, a location in Guam, and an airport in Japan.

Virgin Orbit's Boeing 747 carrier aircraft, named "Cosmic Girl," took off from Mojave on Wednesday morning and climbed to 35,000 feet (nearly 10,700 meters). Pilots Kelly Latimer and Todd Ericson pointed the jumbo jet upward at an angle of more than 25 degrees, then commanded the release of the LauncherOne vehicle from a pylon under the 747's left wing around 9:13 a.m. PDT (12:13 p.m. EDT; 1613 GMT), mimicking maneuvers they will execute during a real launch.

Four Virgin Orbit engineers were also aboard the carrier jet Wednesday.

On an actual mission, the two-stage LauncherOne vehicle will be filled with liquid rocket propellants. For Wednesday's test, ground crews loaded the tanks with water and antifreeze to simulate the propellant, giving the rocket a weight of about 57,000 pounds (about 26 metric tons).

Engineers planned the drop test to gather data on the aerodynamic loads the carrier aircraft will experience when it sheds the nearly 30-ton rocket. Virgin Orbit also wanted to observe how the instrumented LauncherOne test vehicle performed in the first few seconds after release.

Reports from the 747 flight crew, and a quick-look review of video and telemetry data, suggested everything worked perfectly Wednesday.

The drop test was the culmination of a series of captive carry test flights since November with the inert LauncherOne vehicle under the 747 carrier jet, a former passenger airliner operated by sister company Virgin Atlantic. Ground crews stripped around 30 tons of weight and passenger seats from the airplane to allow it to haul the LauncherOne rocket aloft.

"It's been a long and hard flight test program, as flight test programs often are, and this is our capstone event, so we're pretty happy about it," Hart said. "The system performed really, really well."

"The whole flight went incredibly well," said Latimer, Virgin Orbit's chief test pilot, in a statement. "The release was extremely smooth, and the rocket fell away nicely. There was a small roll with the aircraft, just as we expected. Everything matched what we'd seen in the simulators well — in fact, the release dynamics and the aircraft handling qualities were both better than we expected. This was the best kind of test flight sortie from a test pilot's perspective — an uneventful one."

Virgin Orbit intended the drop test as a full-up practice run to gain confidence as engineers head into the company's first launch campaign.

"Except for the geography — we flew over Edwards — everything else was an exact mission simulation, including having our ground tracking and S-band (telemetry system) going with all the data transmitting," Hart said. "We had a guidance system operating so we could fully understand how the vehicle was operating on the way down."

During LauncherOne's first orbital mission, the carrier aircraft will depart Mojave and head over the Pacific Ocean to release the rocket, which will ignite moments later to climb into space.

The 70-foot-long (21-meter) two-stage LauncherOne vehicle is designed to propel payloads of up to 1,100 pounds (500 kilograms) into a low-altitude equatorial orbit, or up to 661 pounds (300 kilograms) to a 310-mile-high (500-kilometer) sun-synchronous polar orbit.

Virgin Orbit is selling LauncherOne missions for around $12 million, and has already cinched contracts with NASA, the U.S. Air Force, and several commercial customers.

Drop test signals Virgin Orbit's transition into launch operations

Спойлер

The next time "Cosmic Girl" takes to the skies with a rocket, it will carry aloft a space-worthy version of Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne, a vehicle now being assembled inside the company's factory in Long Beach, California.

"This was really the last big non-mission demonstration test, so starting this afternoon, we're in pre-launch mode," Hart said Wednesday.

If everything goes according to plan, Hart said LauncherOne could launch into orbit by the end of the summer,

Engineers finished a series of hold-down engine firings in May to qualify the rocket's propulsion systems for flight.

The NewtonThree engine on the first stage will generate 73,500 pounds of thrust in vacuum, firing for around three minutes on each mission. The second stage's NewtonFour engine will ramp up to 5,000 pounds of thrust, and can be reignited in space to maneuver into different orbits.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2_i2GfiULc (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2_i2GfiULc)
At Virgin Orbit's Long Beach factory, technicians are finishing assembly of the first LauncherOne vehicle to fire into space. They plan to mate the rocket's two stages later this month, officials said, then hand over the launcher to Virgin Orbit's operations team.

The rocket will trucked to Mojave for attachment to the "Cosmic Girl" jumbo jet.

"We have a rocket in the factory," Hart said. "It's integrated. It's been through some of the more complex integrated system checkouts. We've still got a little ways to go, but if everything goes well, we'll have it delivered, and we'll start doing wet dress rehearsals, and the kinds of things you do before you actually launch a rocket for the first time."

The wet dress rehearsals will involve filling the rocket with cryogenic fluid for the first time to practice fueling operations.

"Part of our first flight campaign will be to take our flight rocket and do one flight test with cryogenics on-board before launch," Hart said. "We plan to use liquid nitrogen, so we don't have our first time with cryogenics with liquid oxygen. That's the way we kind of ease into that first flight."

Unlike Northrop Grumman's air-launched Pegasus rocket, which burns pre-packed solid propellant, the liquid-fueled LauncherOne vehicle will rely on cryogenic liquid oxygen chilled colder than minus 298 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 183 degrees Celsius).

The LauncherOne engines will consume liquid oxygen in a mixture with rocket-grade kerosene.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/145645.jpg)
Virgin Orbit's first LauncherOne vehicle to head into space is completing final assembly in Long Beach, California. Credit: Virgin Orbit

Cryogenic fluids boil off if they get too warm. Rockets launched from the ground typically have their cryogenic propellant supplies continuously replenished until just before liftoff to ensure the tanks are full, but LauncherOne will be disconnected from its propellant supply before takeoff.

LauncherOne's liquid oxygen tanks are coated with spray-on foam insulation to keep the cryogenic fluid insulated during the climb to the rocket's release altitude.

"Boil-off has been a focus, but we've got the system balanced with the right kind of insulation to wh ere that's not an issue," Hart said.

[свернуть]

Virgin Orbit's first test launch could happen in the next two months, Hart told Spaceflight Now on Wednesday.

"If all goes well — and we do have some data to look at and some more testing to do — we're targeting (a launch) before the end of the summer," Hart said.

There are no customer satellites on the first LauncherOne mission to orbit.

"It'll be an engineering test," Hart said. "We'll have a payload because we do want to verify payload activities, as well as our payload operations, but it's an engineering payload, essentially, for the flight test."

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit's Boeing 747 carrier aircraft, named "Cosmic Girl," took off from Mojave on Wednesday morning and climbed to 35,000 feet (nearly 10,700 meters). Pilots Kelly Latimer and Todd Ericson pointed the jumbo jet upward at an angle of more than 25 degrees, then commanded the release of the LauncherOne vehicle from a pylon under the 747's left wing around 9:13 a.m. PDT (12:13 p.m. EDT; 1613 GMT), mimicking maneuvers they will execute during a real launch.

Цитировать https://spacenews.com/virgin-orbit-carries-out-successful-launcherone-drop-test/
...
A half-hour later, the plane released the rocket at an altitude of 10,700 meters above a test range at nearby Edwards Air Force Base.
...

ЦитироватьOn this test, the rocket simply fell to the ground, impacting in an isolated test area.

ЦитироватьLauncherOne Drop Test

Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

Опубликовано: 11 июл. 2019 г.

This week's successful drop test is a huge, huge deal for our team. It represents the last major step of a development program we began in 2015, focused not just on designing a rocket but proving it out alongside the modified 747 that serves as our flying launchpad.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/68305.jpg)Tyler Gray‏ @TylerG1998 (https://twitter.com/TylerG1998) 59 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/TylerG1998/status/1151223620133371905)
A new FCC permit states that the first orbital test flight of @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)'s LauncherOne rocket should occur NET August 19th.

To be clear: this is *not* a target date. But it does give a good idea as to when VO is planning on flying. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125382.png)

Permit link: https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/STA_Print.cfm?mode=current&application_seq=93588&RequestTimeout=1000 ... (https://t.co/pRFYOrDkUo)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ Подлинная учетная запись @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1159513595773890560)
Our payload trailer grants late access to your satellites in a mobile cleanroom environment — just in case you want to say one more good-bye. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125378.png)   Today we're saying good-bye to #SmallSat (https://twitter.com/hashtag/SmallSat?src=hash), but it's not too late to meet our team! Reach out anytime: https://virg.in/SayHello  (https://t.co/rOV6UMZjYg)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/175875.jpg)
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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 25 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1171711577143336960)

Dan Hart, Virgin Orbit: currently completing final system checkouts on first LauncherOne, shipping to Mojave later this month.
#WSBW (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBW?src=hash)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg) Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 28 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1171723250335911937)

Virgin Orbit's Hart says the first launch will likely be "mid-fall" after several weeks of checkouts of the vehicle at Mojave and a captive-carry test flight.
#WSBW (https://twitter.com/hashtag/WSBW?src=hash)

ЦитироватьLauncherOne: Shaping Up and Shipping Out

SEPTEMBER 24, 2019

Like a beautiful, 70-foot-long bird made of carbon fiber and science, the time has come for us to push our next rocket out of the nest.

This week, after a very hard drive by our teammates in our Long Beach factory, we waved good-bye to our latest test rocket. Our previous LauncherOne served valiantly through a battery of tests highlighted by several captive carry flights (https://www.instagram.com/p/BybTdllh_z9/) and especially by our flawless drop test (https://virginorbit.com/virgin-orbit-completes-key-drop-test-ahead-of-orbital-test-flight/). Our latest rocket — which has already been fully integrated, tested, checked, re-checked, analyzed, and triple-checked — is destined for a rigorous crucible of engineering demonstrations and tests of its own. The final demonstration for this rocket will also be the biggest test we've attempted as a team: during that test, we'll fire up LauncherOne's engine in flight and head for space for the first time.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196298.jpg)

Over the last month, we've subjected the rocket to an array of full-vehicle system checkouts. The work, ranging fr om electromagnetic interference (EMI) tests to guidance and navigation tests, from sequence tests to transmitter checks, has led us to quite literally poke, prod and inspect every aspect of this launch vehicle. And after each test we gathered to ask ourselves the hardest questions and dig deeply into the data. It took some time but in this business it pays to be incredibly thorough — we know full well what the historical odds are for maiden flights of brand new launch systems, and we intend to give ourselves the best chance of success.

Now, we've shipped the rocket to our test site up in Mojave to begin our first proper launch campaign. If you don't come from the aerospace industry, at this point you may be wondering: If the rocket is already fully built and tested, why don't you just launch the dang thing tomorrow?

Well, we can appreciate that all the rocket fans out there are in high anticipation of our first launch — just imagine how excited those of us who work here feel! But the lead up to first flight is not the time to take shortcuts. It's crucial that every element comes together seamlessly. Our stage test campaign taught us how to safely operate the rocket and our ground support equipment, while our flight test campaign improved our understanding of how the two vehicles behave in the air. But as we gear up for our maiden flight, it's the combination of the two that will be most important. The main takeaway from these final few exercises is verification of our integrated launch and flight systems.

Our orbital test flight rocket is currently being installed into a newly built test stand in Mojave, wh ere in the coming weeks we'll run through a number of critical exercises, including loading and fueling with our mobile ground support equipment. We are prepping and practicing, making sure we know how to do everything we could conceivably ever need to do. Then, it's off to the skies — first for a captive carry flight, and then for the launch itself.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196299.jpg)

So, although it was somewhat of a bittersweet farewell, we're thrilled that this rocket is on its way. We hated to see it go, but we can't wait to see it fly away!

To stay in the loop as Virgin Orbit prepares for our first flight to space, follow us on Twitter (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/virginorbit/), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/virgin.orbit/?hl=en) and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/virgin-orbit/) — or sign up for our monthly newsletter (https://virginorbit.us14.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=024c85414431f25ca6edb2012&id=ed9357e7af), chock full of technical updates and small satellite news from around the world.

ЦитироватьЧебурашка написал:
Ну так что?
В этом году пуск будет или нет?

Цитировать2019 Highlights

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220476.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

19 дек. 2019 г.

2019 has been one hell of a year for the Virgin Orbit team. We entered this year with a brilliant team and a lot of cool technology — but there were some really big milestones we still had yet to cross.

We hadn't yet fired our main stage.  We had mountains of simulations for how to fly, but hadn't run though a full mission sequence in software, much less done so with a fully integrated rocket on the test stand. And we hadn't actually taken off with a fully loaded rocket strapped to its wing.  

As of today, we've done all of that and so, so much more.

ЦитироватьIn One Year and Out the Other
DECEMBER 19, 2019
   
2019 has been one hell of a year for the Virgin Orbit crew. We entered this year with a brilliant team and a lot of cool technology — but there were some really big milestones we still had yet to cross. 12 months ago, we hadn't yet qualified an engine for flight. We hadn't yet fired our main stage.  We had mountains of simulations for how to fly, but hadn't run though a full mission sequence in software, much less done so with a fully integrated rocket on the test stand. And we hadn't actually taken off with a fully loaded rocket strapped to its wing.  

As of today, we've done all of that and so, so much more. We aced a series of progressively challenging test flights, culminating in a hugely successful drop test over Edwards Air Force Base. We've completed hundreds of hotfires on our main stage engine, NewtonThree, and hundreds more on our upper stage engine, Newton Four. We've had moments of great triumph after picture-perfect tests — and, as comes with the territory, we've had days where Murphy's law taught us a few new lessons.

At the beginning of 2019, we set some extremely ambitious goals for a company that was barely two years old: to fully qualify our "flying launch site," to convert our Long Beach headquarters from an R&D facility into a high-rate production factory, and to conduct our first demonstration launch. As bold as those goals seemed — each of those three projects historically take companies many years to do — we came damn close to actually pulling it off. Our flying launch site is indeed ready to go, and our factory is now full of flight hardware for a half-dozen rockets and breakthrough automation to help us build more.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196301.jpg)

Most recently, we delivered a beautiful, flight-worthy rocket to the launch site after qualifying a boat-load of components and fielding a state-of-the-art launch control system. But with the clock winding down on December, we're not quite ready to check off that third and most ambitious goal.

Thankfully, everything that we've accomplished in recent months has placed us in prime position for an imminent orbital demo flight. So here's what to expect in the coming weeks as we push to close out our first launch campaign.

In our most recent update, we mentioned that we were driving through final procedure rehearsals. We're coming up on the tail end of that, having completed multiple propellant load cycles and pressurization testing on the orbital test rocket while working around the clock at our Mojave operations site. We've pushed our system to ensure it is ready for flight, and our team has driven hard to lock down the procedures that keep our operations safe and smooth. With each repetition, our countdown has become more synced and repeatable.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196302.png) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196300.jpg)

Now, we're getting ready to shift all of our operations to the customized 747 that serves as our fully mobile launch site. Parked at "the hammerhead," a part of the taxiway adjoining the primary runway at the Mojave Air and Spaceport, we'll do the final mate of the rocket to Cosmic Girl and run through our rehearsals again.

In January, we plan to have Chief Test Pilot Kelly Latimer and the rest of our flight crew guide us through one more taxi test with the mated rocket and an additional captive carry test with our orbital flight hardware. Then, we'll be ready to light this candle and conduct our launch demonstration.

For years, everything's been building: our team, our market, our technical expertise, and our enthusiasm. As 2019 draws to a close, we're stronger and smarter than we've ever been before, and feeling ready to rock.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit plans orbital launch in early 2020
by Jeff Foust (https://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — December 31, 2019

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/191620.jpg)
An inert LauncherOne rocket falls away fr om its 747 carrier aircraft in a July test. Virgin Orbit now says its first orbital launch attempt will take place after a final series of taxi and captive carry flight tests in January. Credit: Virgin Orbit

WASHINGTON — After falling short of plans to begin launches in 2019, Virgin Orbit now expects to perform its first orbital launch attempt in early 2020, a key year for the burgeoning small launch vehicle industry.

In a Dec. 19 statement, Virgin Orbit says it is now in position to perform an "imminent orbital demo flight" some time in early 2020 as it completes rehearsals of launch preparations at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California.

In that statement, Virgin Orbit said it plans to perform a taxi test of "Cosmic Girl," its modified Boeing 747 aircraft, with a LauncherOne vehicle attached. That will be followed by a captive carry flight where the rocket will remain attached to the plane throughout the flight. "Then, we'll be ready to light this candle and conduct our launch demonstration," the company said.

Earlier in the year, the company had said it planned to carry out that first LauncherOne mission before the end of 2019 (https://spacenews.com/virgin-orbit-moves-closer-to-first-launch/). Dan Hart, chief executive of Virgin Orbit, said at the World Satellite Business Week conference in Paris Sept. 11 that he expected that orbital launch to take place "in the middle of this fall."

"In about six weeks, eight weeks, we will be firing the engines on the next drop test and heading at eighteen and a half thousand miles per hour around the Earth in orbit, beginning to drop off satellites," Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, said in a Sept. 16 presentation at the Air Force Association's Air, Space and Cyber Symposium outside Washington.

The company didn't disclose the reason the company missed that schedule for an orbital flight test. It alluded to development issues in its statement, noting there were "days where Murphy's law taught us a few new lessons," but wasn't more specific.

If that initial flight is a success, Virgin Orbit would be ready to move into regular operations relatively quickly. The company said in its statement that it has flight hardware in its Long Beach, California, factory for a half-dozen rockets, and is developing automation "to help us build more."

Virgin Orbit hasn't disclosed a manifest for upcoming launches, but NASA's CubeSat Launch Initiative website (https://spacenews.com/virgin-orbit-moves-closer-to-first-launch/) states that it will fly 10 cubesats on the second flight of LauncherOne, scheduled for no earlier than the middle of February. Another cubesat will fly on a later LauncherOne mission, scheduled for early in the second quarter of 2020, this time out of Andersen Air Force Base in Guam. Virgin Orbit announced in April 2019 it planned to perform flights out of Guam, citing the ability to perform launches to almost any inclination.

Virgin Orbit's plans will start what's likely to be a critical year for the small launch vehicle business, one wh ere dozens of companies are seeking a foothold in a market that most observers believe can support no more than a few vehicles. One of those companies, Rocket Lab, is already regularly launching its Electron rocket, with six successful launches in as many attempts in 2019, a launch rate the company seeks to double in 2020.

Firefly Aerospace is working on its Alpha launch vehicle that the company once planned to launch by the end of 2019. Firefly now expects the first flight of that vehicle no earlier than the first quarter of 2020 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Relativity, which once planned a first launch of its Terran 1 vehicle in 2020, recently said that launch will take place no earlier than February 2021.

Small launch vehicle development extends beyond American startups. Several Chinese companies are working on small launch vehicles. The Indian space agency ISRO plans to perform the first flight of its Small Satellite Launch Vehicle, developed to compete for dedicated launches of small satellites, in 2020.

The large number of small launch vehicles under development — more than 100 by some estimates — has led to widespread speculation that a shakeout will take place in the near future given the lack of demand for that many vehicles. While one small launch vehicle developer, Vector, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Dec. 13, its problems have been linked to financial and managerial issues specific to the company and not part of a broader industry trend.

[свернуть]

ЦитироватьUpcoming ELaNa CubeSat Launches

ELaNa 20
Date: Mid February 2020
Mission: Virgin Orbit - Flight 2, LauncherOne – Mojave, CA
10 CubeSat Missions scheduled to be deployed

[/li]
• CACTUS-1 – Capitol Technology University, Laurel, Maryland
  
• CAPE-3 – University of Louisiana, Lafayette, Louisiana
  
• EXOCUBE – California Polytechnic University, San Louis Obispo, California
  
• INCA – New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico
  
• MiTEE – University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
  
• PICS – Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah
  
• PolarCube – University of Colorado at Boulder, Colorado
  
• Q-PACE – University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida
  
• RadFXSat-2 – Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee
  
• TechEdSat-7 – NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California
  

ELaNa 29
Date:  Early Q2 2020
Mission:  Virgin Orbit, LauncherOne – Anderson Air Force Base, Guam
1 CubeSat Mission scheduled to be deployed

[/li]
• PAN – Cornell University, Ithaca, New York
  
  
  

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/75504.jpg) (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) Virgin Orbit✔@Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 11:18 PM - Mar 3, 2020 (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1234936330632613888)

There's something particularly magical about nighttime hotfires in the vast expanse of the Mojave Desert! (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125305.png)

Illuminating the test stand here is our NewtonFour engine, which powers LauncherOne's upper stage.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180800.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180799.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 6 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1237110437751058432)

Check out this bird's eye view of Cosmic Girl and LauncherOne taken during a successful taxi test (with cryogenics loaded) last week!

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180815.jpg)


6 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1237110505153507330)

As we gear up for our launch demo, big rehearsals like this are crucial to verifying the procedures we've developed to keep our people and hardware safe in those key moments just before takeoff.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1241168535759380480)

Our Response to COVID-19 ↓

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181100.jpg)

ЦитироватьOita Partners with Virgin Orbit to Establish First Horizontal Spaceport in Asia
APRIL 2, 2020

Oita Prefecture to Foster Local NewSpace Industry Following Collaboration with Virgin Orbit

Oita, Japan/Long Beach, California — April 2, 2020 — Virgin Orbit, the California-based small satellite launch company, has announced a new partnership with Oita Prefecture to bring horizontal launch to Japan. With the support of regional partners ANA Holdings Inc. and the Space Port Japan Association, Virgin Orbit has identified Oita Airport as its preferred pilot launch site — yet another addition to the company's growing global network of horizontal launch sites — in pursuit of a mission to space from Japan as early as 2022.

Virgin Orbit and Oita Prefecture have agreed to commence a joint technical study to facilitate development of the future spaceport.

Oita Prefecture is widely recognized in Japan as not only a top-ranked tourist destination, but also as a hub for numerous high-tech ecosystems, including the steel, petrochemical, semiconductor, and automobile industries. The Oita Prefectural Government now has ambitions to extend that leadership into the space domain.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196305.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196306.jpg)
Photo Credit: Oita Prefecture

"We are eager to host the first horizontal takeoff and landing spaceport in Japan. We are also honored to be able to collaborate with brave technology companies solving global-level problems through their small satellites," said Katsusada Hirose, Governor for the Oita Prefectural Government. "We hope to foster a cluster of space industry in our prefecture, starting with our collaboration with Virgin Orbit."

"As the global use of smaller satellites and related launch activities are expected to ramp up rapidly in the coming years, a flexible domestic launch capability becomes a crucial factor. It's a key element in ensuring the availability and responsiveness of launch — a core enabler for the growing space economy," said Dan Hart, CEO for Virgin Orbit. "As Japan looks to establish a regional launch hub for Asia, we're very excited to work alongside Oita to enable launch operations for space ventures, stimulate the local economy, and facilitate the growth of Japan's broader space ecosystem."

LauncherOne, Virgin Orbit's uniquely mobile launch system, will leverage sites around the world like Oita to provide flexible and responsive flights to space for a broad variety of customers. Most recently, the UK Space Agency announced a multi-million dollar grant to facilitate horizontal launches from Spaceport Cornwall, and in April 2019, Virgin Orbit revealed that it would also conduct launches from Andersen Air Force Base on the Pacific island of Guam. Even now, Virgin Orbit is working closely with multiple governments and international organizations interested in establishing launch capabilities closer to home.

After successfully demonstrating all major vehicle assemblies and completing an extensive flight test program, the Virgin Orbit team is in the midst of final preparations for an orbital launch demonstration expected soon.

ABOUT VIRGIN ORBIT

Virgin Orbit builds and operates the most flexible and responsive satellite launcher ever invented: LauncherOne, a dedicated launch service for commercial and government-built small satellites. LauncherOne rockets are designed and manufactured in Long Beach, California, and will be air-launched from our modified 747-400 carrier aircraft – allowing us to operate from locations all over the world in order to best serve each customer's needs. Virgin Orbit's systems are currently in an advanced stage of testing, with initial orbital launches expected soon. To learn more or to apply to join Virgin Orbit's talented and growing team, visit virginorbit.com (https://virginorbit.com/).

[свернуть]

ABOUT ANA

Following the "Inspiration of Japan" high quality of service, ANA has been awarded the respected 5-Star rating every year since 2013 from SKYTRAX. ANA is the only Japanese airline to win this prestigious designation seven years in a row. Additionally, ANA has been recognized by Air Transport World as "Airline of the Year" three times in the past 10 years — 2007, 2013 and 2018, becoming one of the few airlines to win this prestigious award multiple times.

ANA was founded in 1952 with two helicopters and has become the largest airline in Japan, as well as one of the most significant airlines in Asia, operating 77 international routes and 118 domestic routes. ANA offers a unique dual hub model which enables passengers to travel to Tokyo and connect through the two airports in the metropolitan Tokyo, Narita and Haneda, to various destinations throughout Japan, and also offers same day connections between various North American, Asian and Chinese cities.

ANA has been a member of Star Alliance since 1999 and has joint venture partnerships with United Airlines, Lufthansa German Airlines, Swiss International Airlines and Austrian Airlines.

In addition to the full service and award-winning record of ANA, the ANA Group's subsidiary Peach Aviation Limited is the leading LCC in Japan, and has expanded following the integration of Vanilla Air Inc. in late 2019. The ANA Group carried 54.4 million passengers in FY2018, has approximately 43,000 employees and a fleet of 260 aircraft. ANA is a proud launch customer and the biggest operator of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. For more information, please refer to the following link: https://www.ana.co.jp/group/en/ (https://www.ana.co.jp/group/en/)

[свернуть]

ЦитироватьДля испытаний запусков спутников с самолёта Virgin Orbit выбрала Японию
04.04.2020 15:54,    Геннадий Детинич                                              
На днях компания Virgin Orbit сообщила, что испытательным полигоном для первых запусков в космос (https://3dnews.ru/990544) спутников с самолёта выбран (https://virginorbit.com/oita-partners-with-virgin-orbit-to-establish-first-horizontal-spaceport-in-asia/) аэропорт города Оита в Японии (остров Косю). Это может стать разочарованием для правительства Великобритании, которое вкладывает в этот проект деньги с расчётом создать национальную систему запуска спутников на базе аэропорта в графстве Корнуолл.


(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/124587.jpg)
Аэропорт в Оита выбран компанией Virgin Orbit с прицелом на создание центра воздушных запусков спутников (микроспутников) в Юго-Восточной Азии. Очевидно, там будет больше денег, чем в «старой доброй Англии». В то же время система «воздушный старт» подразумевает гибкий подход к месту запуска спутников, поскольку стартовая площадка в виде модифицированного лайнера Boeing 747-400 «Cosmic Girl» может быть переброшена в условно любую точку мира.


Партнёрами Virgin Orbit в аэропорту Оита станут местные компании, входящие в ANA Holdings и ассоциация Space Port Japan Association. Предполагается, что сотрудничество приведёт к появлению интегрированной вместе с гражданскими авиационными службами структуре, которая создаст новые рынки, связанные с расширением спроса на микроспутники. Похоже, скоро каждая уважающая себя компания жить не сможет без своего спутника.


Что касается первых запусков ракеты носителя LauncherOne с борта Boeing 747-400, то он ожидается в 2022 году. В настоящий момент, как сообщает компания, «проект находится на развитой стадии испытаний, и в ближайшее время ожидаются первые орбитальные пуски».

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/124588.jpg) Аэропорт в городе Оита (Япония)

Самолёт Boeing 747-400 «Cosmic Girl» должен поднимать 21-метровый ракетоноситель LauncherOne с полезным грузом на борту на высоту свыше 9 км, после чего ракета будет отделяться, запускать собственный двигатель и выходить в космос. Подобная схема обещает удешевить вывод на орбиту небольших спутников.

Цитировать

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196303.jpg)

Up Next: Our Final Development Test

APRIL 10, 2020

After five years of hard work, our team is now ready to conduct the final test of our development program and the last major step prior to our Launch Demo. In the very near future, we will conduct a cryogenic captive carry flight with our first orbital rocket. This test will be a complete, end-to-end launch rehearsal that exercises all of our ground operations; our mission control; all of our communications systems and protocols; all of our range assets; and our carrier aircraft's takeoff, flyout, pull-up maneuver, and return-to-base operations.

Before we tell you a bit more about the test, let's start with a recap — because so much is happening in the world that March already feels like a million years ago.

In the early days of 2020, we wrapped up an intense campaign of in situ checkouts and launch rehearsals on our first orbital rocket. With that work completed, we moved our rocket off of a custom-built test stand and moved it to meet the rest of our launch system. We parked at the end of the primary taxiway at the Mojave Air and Space Port, just feet away fr om where we will begin our Launch Demo soon.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196304.jpg)

That's the entire footprint of our mobile infrastructure in one photograph — a far cry from most traditional, ground-launched systems, and a big reason why we'll soon be able to operate the most flexible, most responsive orbital launch service in the world.

With our full system in place — with the MegaZord united, as we jokingly say — we began running through another huge batch of fueling operations, full-team mission simulations, telemetry hand-off exercises, devilishly designed "mayhem" scenarios designed to push our team to the limits, and several rounds of important readiness reviews. None of it was terribly flashy, but it's the kind of work that is sensible to do before debuting a brand new launch system.

And then, a global pandemic happened.

Like everyone else, COVID-19 is changing our lives and dominating our thoughts. Even as an essential business requested to remain open, we've made major changes to our plans, our work spaces, our procedures, and our schedules in order to keep our teammates safe and to help flatten the curve (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1241168535759380480). We've also devoted a great deal of effort to answering the medical community's call for a simpler, faster-to-produce ventilator (https://virginorbit.com/update-on-virgin-orbit-ventilators/). But through it all, we've continued the push towards our primary mission: developing the world's most flexible and responsive launch system.

As the pandemic reached our home in California, we sent all of our staff home with full pay, giving them a week to prepare for the many changes that were to come for them and their families — and giving ourselves all the time we needed to design an entirely new way of working. Ours is an industry accustomed to dealing with hazards and to thinking thoroughly and intentionally about how to keep our people safe. We put that knowledge and training to good use here.

We reconfigured our Mission Control. We re-wrote procedures for our technicians on the shop floor and at the test site in order to meet social distancing requirements. We were already accustomed to using Personal Protective Equipment during many of our operations — but now we are ramping up our standards to match the latest guidelines from the CDC and other leading medical experts. And of course, we are spending extra time regularly sterilizing every square inch of our manufacturing facility, constantly educating our staff, and much more.

With a robust plan for safe operations in place, we began bringing essential teammates back on site — but continue to have as much as 90% of our staff working remotely.

With the steady progress of our remote work and with a few weeks of getting used to our new COVID-19 accommodations, we are now ready for the final development test of our launch program: a cryogenic captive carry flight.

Very soon, you'll see Cosmic Girl and a fully loaded LauncherOne lift off from the main runway at the Mojave Air and Space Port, carrying our first orbital rocket for the most complete capstone test of our entire pre-launch process yet.

We've conducted captive carry tests in the past, including several with a fully loaded rocket. But for those tests, our tanks were full of water — which is great for testing weight and balance, but has one key difference from what'll be in the tanks during a launch: it's more than 300°F (185°C) warmer. Cryogenic liquids have some important differences both in how they interact with the hardware and in how they are handled by our crew. All the more reason to be extremely thorough in kicking the proverbial tires before we're ready to launch.

So, for this end-to-end rehearsal, we'll have liquid nitrogen — which is very similar in temperature to liquid oxygen, but which would pose less of a risk in case anything were to go wrong despite all of our planning — in our LOX tanks for both stages.

We've put in the work through hardware and software tests, loading and unloading sequences, and crew training rehearsals. We've gone through our test readiness process and are now poised to start operations soon. When the time comes, we will be very, very pleased to check the box on this final test of our development program.

Once that's done, we'll be nearly ready for the big kahuna, our Launch Demo. Of course, we'll first pore over the data from this captive carry flight; and we'll run through a few last rehearsals, giving the team a few additional chances to practice their jobs with our new COVID-19 procedures in place. But the Launch Demo will be squarely in our sights.

Our team is laser-focused and working methodically. We're doing so with the full knowledge of the statistics behind maiden voyages of rockets. All of us in aerospace know that about half of all rockets fail on their first launch attempt. Each team of intrepid rocketeers knows that in spite of all of our hard work we can never rule out that possibility. But we are also armed with the confidence that this pursuit is worth the struggle to overcome its inherent challenges, and comforted by the knowledge that we'll learn so much about how our system operates. We'll build on the good and figure out wh ere improvements are needed and why. We are doing our level best to make the day a big success — and preparing for absolutely every scenario.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69678.jpg) Jack Beyer‏ @thejackbeyer (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer) 23 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1248980951499075584)

Looks like @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)'s cryogenic captive carry test of their Launcher One rocket could occur as early as this morning. I'm headed to Mojave Air and Spaceport now to try and catch Cosmic Girl's takeoff. @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181736.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181737.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181735.jpg)


20 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1249023266930307073)

It's a beautiful day for flight test here at Mojave Air and Spaceport. Unfortunately Cosmic Girl's cabin door is open and it's still surrounded by ground support equipment. Something tells me we're scrubbed for the day. @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight) – Mojave Air and Space Port (https://twitter.com/search?q=place%3A0fc2eb4d5594d000)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181754.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181752.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181753.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69678.jpg) Jack Beyer‏ @thejackbeyer (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer) 49 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1249374530469900288)

Good morning from Mojave Air and Space Port! You're looking at @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)'s 747 Cosmic Girl, with what appears to be a fueled or fueling Launcher One rocket slung under the wing. The plan today is likely to fuel the rocket and then conduct a short test flight. @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181490.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181488.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181489.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 36 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249378408426958848)

Good morning fr om Mojave, wh ere our team is preparing for an end-to-end, capstone launch rehearsal of LauncherOne — the final test of our development program.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181491.jpg)


38 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249378481038716928)

We've been pushing hard to prepare for this moment — rehearsing fueling operations, testing our telemetry hand-offs, simulating full-team missions, and all the other kind of work that needs to be done before debuting a new rocket.


17 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249384097710915585)

Our ground ops team completed fuel (RP-1) loading last night and began loading LN2 a little over an hour ago. We're watching weather closely; currently, it looks good for our target takeoff time around 11 AM.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249390492933971970)

LN2 has been fully loaded and the flight crew is onboard. Off to a smooth start today.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 11 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249402881897140224)

Alrighty, here we go! Cosmic Girl, with LauncherOne underwing, has taken off from the runway at Mojave Air and Space Port. We're flying out to what will be the drop point for our upcoming Launch Demo.

ЦитироватьKZLA

04/017 (A0694/20) - AIRSPACE VIRGIN ORBIT STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN
AREA DEFINED AS
3400N11950W TO 3255N11930W TO 3245N12030W TO 3400N12040W TO POINT OF ORIGIN FL290-FL400.
12 APR 17:30 2020 UNTIL 12 APR 21:00 2020.
CREATED: 09 APR 22:14 2020

04/018 (A0695/20) - AIRSPACE VIRGIN ORBIT STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN
AREA DEFINED AS
3400N11950W TO 3255N11930W TO 3245N12030W TO 3400N12040W TO POINT OF ORIGIN FL290-FL400.
13 APR 17:30 2020 UNTIL 13 APR 21:00 2020.
CREATED: 09 APR 22:22 2020

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69678.jpg)Jack Beyer‏ @thejackbeyer (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer) 8 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1249406290834554885)

There you have it! @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)'s Cosmic Girl took off with a fueled Launcher One rocket just after 11am this morning for a cryogenic captive carry test. @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181499.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181501.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181500.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 19 сек. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249409173894254592)

Today's test is going well! We are verifying all of our systems and working our way through our procedures. All systems are healthy and conditions are nominal.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69678.jpg) Jack Beyer‏ @thejackbeyer (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer) 12 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1249413932806098945)

Here's video from my vantage point of Cosmic Girl's takeoff today. Absolutely beautiful. @Virgin_Orbit  (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)

https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1249413818418991104/pu/vid/1280x720/6NFVndLOhwC4Lvdq.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1249413818418991104/pu/vid/1280x720/6NFVndLOhwC4Lvdq.mp4) (0:42)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69536.jpg) Pauline Acalin‏ @w00ki33 (https://twitter.com/w00ki33) 17 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/w00ki33/status/1249413172236177408)

Beautiful LN2 liftoff out in the Mojave desert of @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)'s Cosmic Girl carrying the Launcher One rocket! The team has been working super hard for this moment. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125510.png)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125426.png) for @SuperclusterHQ (https://twitter.com/SuperclusterHQ)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181508.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181507.jpg)


(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/30343.jpg) Supercluster‏ @SuperclusterHQ (https://twitter.com/SuperclusterHQ) 10 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/SuperclusterHQ/status/1249415478554083329)

Liftoff! @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)'s 747 'Cosmic Girl' takes flight over the Mojave desert with their LauncherOne rocket.

This is company's final test in their development program.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125426.png) : @w00ki33 (https://twitter.com/w00ki33) for Supercluster

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181509.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181510.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67516.jpg) Jonathan McDowell‏ @planet4589 (https://twitter.com/planet4589) 6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1249421934586183681)

Virgin Orbit's Cosmic Girl launch plane rehearsing the drop pattern for the planned Launcher One flight  - from FlightRadar24

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/181513.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 2 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249424297434599424)

We've successfully completed our pull-up maneuver and simulated drop. Everything has looked good thus far on this capstone launch rehearsal. Cosmic Girl heading back to base.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 10 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249434121450840064)

Our flying launch pad has returned to base and our crew are all smiles. We're putting the finishing touches on today's successful cryogenic captive carry flight.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 11 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249434281283223553)

Beautiful pull-up maneuver today!

https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/EVbhzvsUcAAx2Jg.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/EVbhzvsUcAAx2Jg.mp4) (0:02)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 9 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1249434993853476864)

And here are a few more photos, courtesy of our chase plane.

That's a wrap on today's rehearsal, the final major test before our upcoming launch demo. We'll have more updates very soon — thanks for following along today! (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69678.jpg) Jack Beyer‏ @thejackbeyer (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer) 6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1249436603220553729)

Cosmic Girl has landed back at MHV after a successful cryogenic captive carry test of their Launcher One rocket. Congratulations to everyone who put in hard work to make this happen. @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight)

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(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/69536.jpg) Pauline Acalin‏ @w00ki33 (https://twitter.com/w00ki33) 4 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/w00ki33/status/1249437197830250496)

Touchdown! Cosmic Girl has safely landed from her LN2 mission. Hope all went well once the data is analyzed. Way to go VO!

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125426.png) for @SuperclusterHQ (https://twitter.com/SuperclusterHQ)

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Цитировать

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U.S. SPACE FORCE TO LAUNCH THREE SMALLSAT MISSIONS ON LAUNCHERONE

APRIL 10, 2020

Virgin Orbit Subsidiary VOX Space Secures $35m Contract for Dedicated Launches

El Segundo, CA — April 10, 2020 — VOX Space, the Virgin Orbit subsidiary which provides responsive and affordable launch services for the U.S. national security community, has been selected to launch three dedicated missions for the U.S. Space Force (USSF), delivering multiple spacecraft to orbit for the Department of Defense (DoD) Space Test Program-S28 (STP-S28). This launch service contract — awarded by the USSF Rocket Systems Launch Program (RSLP) Office in Albuquerque, NM — is the first task order under the Orbital Services Program-4 (OSP-4) Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract.

OSP-4 allows the U.S. government to rapidly acquire flexible, resilient and affordable launch services, unlocking the ability to launch missions to space within 12 to 24 months of the task order award. This responsiveness is a critical capability in today's contested space domain.  

The goal of the STP-S28 mission is to deploy multiple technology demonstrations to Low Earth Orbit, enabling advancements in space domain awareness and communications and informing future developments of the USSF space architecture. VOX Space and Virgin Orbit will complete the mission by conducting three separate launches with the LauncherOne system, delivering more than three dozen small satellites to orbit. The schedule for these flights is subject to change, but the first launch could occur as early as October 2021.

"We're very eager to bring a new standard of flexibility in launch to the U.S. national security community with LauncherOne," said VOX Space President Mandy Vaughn. "We see the STP-S28 mission as an excellent example of how cutting-edge commercial launch systems like ours can enable the U.S. Space Force to execute missions in a way that's more tactically responsive. We look forward to working with Col. Rob Bongiovi, Lt. Col. Ryan Rose, and their excellent team at the Space and Missile System Center."

"With the space domain more contested than ever, it's crucial that we find ways to enable those responsible for space security to act quickly and effectively. Ultimately, we believe that affordable and responsive launch helps keep everyone safer — in part by creating a major disincentive for adversaries to work against existing satellites and space systems. LauncherOne is proving to be an impactful force for good as we work with our nation's leaders to modernize our space systems and help keep people safe," said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart.

"We are excited to partner with VOX Space and believe the STP-S28 mission will showcase industry innovation, international partnering and provide a gateway to work with some of the newest, leading-edge entrants for emerging small launch service providers," said Lt. Col. Ryan Rose, chief of the Small Launch and Targets Division at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico.

After successfully demonstrating all major vehicle assemblies, the Virgin Orbit and VOX Space team is in the midst of final preparations for an orbital launch demonstration expected soon.

ЦитироватьДимитър написал:
Красивые картинки - это хорошо! А запускать ракету когда? Собирались в начале 2019...  

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit Cosmic Girl, LauncherOne Cryogenic Captive Carry test flight

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220420.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSUu1lih2RifWkKtDOJdsBA) NASASpaceflight (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSUu1lih2RifWkKtDOJdsBA)

13 апр. 2020 г.

The successful cryogenic captive carry test flight for LauncherOne under the wing of Cosmic Girl, the final major test before our upcoming launch demo.

Video and Tower Audio from Jack Beyer (@thejackbeyer) for NSF.

ЦитироватьСтарый написал:
Запускать несуществующую ракету опасно - может не полететь.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit выполнила последний испытательный полёт перед орбитальным запуском LauncherOne
12 апреля Virgin Orbit совершила заключительный испытательный полет своей системы LauncherOne, который стал последней крупной вехой перед тем, как компания совершит свою первую попытку запуска на орбиту.
Модифицированный самолет Boeing 747 компании Virgin Orbit с ракетой LauncherOne, прикрепленной к его левому крылу, вылетел из воздушно-космического порта Мохаве в Калифорнии в 14:23 по восточному времени. Самолёт пролетел над Тихим океаном к югу от Санта-Барбары, чтобы имитировать запуск, прежде чем, примерно через два часа вернуться обратно в Мохаве, с ракетой под крылом.
В прошлом Virgin Orbit уже выполняла подобные испытательные полеты, но это был первый полет с летной версией LauncherOne, заполненной топливом RP-1 и жидким азотом. Во время полета самолет выполнил маневр как припуске ракеты, при котором самолет резко тянет вверх после запуска.
В заявлении от 10 апреля Virgin Orbit описала предстоящий полет как "полную репетицию запуска» для самолета и наземных операций, за исключением использования жидкого азота, как более безопасной альтернативы жидкому кислороду, используемому для запуска ракеты-носителя. Это испытание, по словам компании, было также "последним крупным шагом перед нашим демонстрационным запуском", или первой попыткой орбитального запуска.
Virgin Orbit планировала осуществить полет с подвешенной ракетой в начале этого года, но он задержался, отчасти из-за пандемии коронавируса. В то время как многие космические компании, признанные правительственными учреждениями "жизненно важными" и получившие таким образом разрешение оставаться открытыми, Virgin Orbit отправила своих сотрудников домой с оплатой за неделю в прошлом месяце, чтобы они могли справиться с проблемами, вызванными пандемией, а также скорректировать процедуры, чтобы обеспечить безопасное продолжение операций на местах.
Эта работа, как говорилось в предыдущем заявлении Virgin Orbit, включала в себя перенастройку своего центра управления полетами и переписывание процедур в цехе, чтобы соответствовать рекомендуемому дистанцированию. Изменения также включают более частые уборки рабочих мест и все более широкое использование средств индивидуальной защиты. Даже с учетом этих изменений, по оценкам компании, до 90% ее сотрудников по-прежнему работают удаленно.
Выполненный полёт — это последнее крупное испытание перед первой попыткой запуска. "Конечно, сначала мы изучим данные, полученные в этом полёте и проведем несколько последних репетиций, давая команде несколько дополнительных шансов попрактиковаться в своей работе с нашими новыми процедурами COVID-19″, — заявили в компании. — Но демонстрационный запуск состоится вскоре."
Virgin Orbit не указала точно, сколько времени пройдет, прежде чем эта попытка орбитального запуска может состояться. Ранее официальные представители компании подсчитали, что они будут готовы к запуску уже через пару недель после испытательного полета самолёта с подвешенной ракетой.
(spacenews.com)

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit получила контракт от Космических сил США
 Компания Virgin Orbit получила контракт от Космических сил США на три запуска военной нагрузки, передает SpaceNews. Речь идет о миссии STP-S28, включающей в себя вывод на околоземную орбиту с помощью трех РН LaunchOne 44 малых спутников. Сумма контракта – 35 миллионов долларов.
А.Ж.

ЦитироватьCryogenic Captive Carry Test

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220411.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

15 апр. 2020 г.

Our recent cryogenic (LN2) captive carry flight represented the most realistic rehearsal of our launch system and procedures to date, and we couldn't be happier with the results. Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart had a few words to share as we ready ourselves for an orbital launch demonstration next.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/75504.jpg) (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) Virgin Orbit ✔@Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit)9:46 PM (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1256293812239908864) - May 1, 2020

We're celebrating a big win this week after the successful completion of a wet dress rehearsal with LauncherOne — just in time for #NationalSpaceDay (https://twitter.com/hashtag/NationalSpaceDay?src=hash)!

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9:46 PM (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1256294048484098048) - May 1, 2020

Those of you familiar with spaceflight will know that wet dress rehearsals with all commodities loaded is one of the last major events before launch. Our team did a fantastic job!

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ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit's first launch could happen later this month
May 4, 2020 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/05/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

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Virgin Orbit's carrier jet, named Cosmic Girl, takes off April 12 fr om the Mojave Air and Space Port with the LauncherOne rocket under its left wing. Credit: Gene Blevins/LA Daily News

Virgin Orbit could attempt its first orbital test launch later this month over the Pacific Ocean southwest of Los Angeles, capping a development program for an air-launched small satellite carrier that began in earnest eight years ago.

The small satellite launch company, part of Richard Branson's Virgin Group, entered the final phase of pre-flight testing last week with a ground fueling test of its first flight-worthy LauncherOne rocket.

Dan Hart, Virgin Orbit's CEO, said the company is on track for the rocket's first demonstration launch in May.

The LauncherOne rocket is designed to compete with other commercial smallsat launchers, such as Rocket Lab's Electron booster, for contracts to deliver CubeSats and microsatellites to orbit for commercial customers, the U.S. military and NASA. Virgin Orbit says it can haul up to 660 pounds (300 kilograms) of cargo into a 310-mile-high (500-kilometer) polar sun-synchronous orbit, a standard operating orbit for Earth-imaging satellites.

A dedicated launch by Virgin Orbit sells for around $12 million.

Virgin Orbit completed a cryogenic captive carry test of the LauncherOne rocket April 12, demonstrating the performance of the launch vehicle, its Boeing 747 carrier jet, telemetry and tracking systems, and ground teams. For the captive carry test, Virgin Orbit loaded the two-stage rocket with kerosene fuel, high-pressure gases and super-cold liquid nitrogen to simulate the cryogenic temperature of liquid oxygen, which the LauncherOne vehicle will consume with kerosene during a real launch.

"That was really the capstone test for the development program," Hart said in a recent interview with Spaceflight Now. "We will do a couple of wet dress rehearsals over the next couple of weeks just to flow LOX (liquid oxygen) through the system and verify any minor tweaks we make to the countdown.

Virgin Orbit announced Friday that one of the two planned wet dress rehearsals was successfully completed.

"We'll have our mission readiness review and out launch readiness review, and then we'll be ready to fly," Hart said.

"We're a small number of weeks, and it's really dependent upon, just making sure that there's nothing in the data that pops up ... May is what we're targeting," Hart said.

With its headquarters and rocket factory in Long Beach, California, Virgin Orbit was founded in 2017 as a spinoff to Virgin Galactic, Branson's suborbital space tourism company. Virgin Galactic managed the early years of LauncherOne's development.

Along with Branson's Virgin Group, other investors in Virgin Orbit include Aabar Investments, an Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund.

During the April 12 captive carry flight, Virgin Orbit's Boeing 747 carrier jet took off fr om Mojave Air and Space Port in California's high desert and flew off the coast. With a four-person crew of pilots and launch support engineers, the jumbo jet flew a race track pattern over the Pacific Ocean before lining up for a simulated launch run west of San Nicolas Island, which is owned by the U.S. Navy.

The targeted drop point is located roughly 100 miles (160 kilometers) west-southwest of Long Beach.

Pilot Kelly Latimer commanded the carrier jet — a modified passenger airliner taken fr om the fleet of sister company Virgin Atlantic — into climb angle of more than 25 degrees. On a real launch, the nearly 30-ton rocket will be released fr om a pylon under the 747's left wing during the pull-up maneuver at an altitude of around 35,000 feet (nearly 10,700 meters).

Four seconds after release, the rocket's kerosene-fueled NewtonThree engine will ignite with 73,500 pounds of thrust to begin climbing into orbit.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/150060.jpg)
The drop point for Virgin Orbit's first test launch is located over the Pacific Ocean southwest of Los Angeles. Credit: Google Maps/Spaceflight Now

Virgin Orbit is proceeding with the LauncherOne's debut launch while taking precautions to combat the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time the company readies for the demonstration launch, Virgin Orbit engineers are producing simplified ventilator devices to help patients with moderate cases of the COVID-19 viral disease.

The Food and Drug Administration approved Virgin Orbit's ventilator design, which was conceived and produced in less than a month, for emergency use April 23. The company said the California Emergency Medical Services Authority ordered a batch of the "bridge ventilators" for potential use in hospitals throughout the state.

In an interview with Spaceflight Now, Hart said Virgin Orbit adjusted the layout of the company's launch control rooms for the LauncherOne demonstration flight to reduce the chances of exposure to the coronavirus for company employees.

"We have conversations about this every day, and pretty much every week, we either alter course or adjust as we need," Hart said. "So far, with the provisions that we put in place, we've been in pretty good shape. And we're trying to be leading edge. We monitor our peers in other companies, and what people are doing, what the CDC is advising, what the governor's office is mandating, but we also look at best practices across businesses."

Virgin Orbit needs fewer than a dozen technicians and engineers to prepare the 70-foot-long (21-meter) rocket for launch. On launch day, ground teams at Mojave Air and Space Port will connect and disconnect propellant loading lines, perform inspections and complete other tasks before the carrier aircraft — named "Cosmic Girl" — taxi to the runway for takeoff.

"We'll have 10 who come in periodically to the rocket, during about two different periods of about a half an hour," Hart said. "We'll have the aircraft ground crew of roughly four or five people who come in at the key moments when the aircraft needs to taxi out, and then we'll have the four flight crew, and then me."

For the first launch, the company will distribute its launch controllers and engineering support team among six rooms in Mojave and at Virgin Orbit's headquarters in Long Beach. Virgin Orbit also installed dividers between the control consoles.

"Normally, you want eye-to-eye compact," Hart said. "In this case, dividers are both really beneficial fr om a health point of view, and it also gives you some peace of mind. We did quite a bit of work on the facility itself. We went fr om probably two-and-a-half rooms to more like six rooms. Big difference."

The launch control team has also rehearsed countdown procedures virtually, he said.

"So we ran through countdowns while people were sitting at home, going through nominal and off-nominal ops, and going through the handbook and all our malfunction procedures, so they could get the hang of going through a countdown where you don't have eye-to-eye contact."

We're looking forward to it," Hart said. "We're going to stay very focused. Launch, by its very nature, requires a laser focus. Hopefully, COVID doesn't get us anywhere and we're able to manage through it in the current modes that we're in. I'm keeping my eyes peeled. If we see distractions or issues pop up in the environment, we'll rethink and replan."

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Virgin Orbit last week completed a wet dress rehearsal on its LauncherOne rocket. Credit: Virgin Orbit

Hart estimated that the work slow-down caused by the company's initial response to the coronavirus pandemic caused a delay of around three weeks in LauncherOne's debut test flight.

The successful outcome of the April 12 captive carry test raised confidence in Virgin Orbit's readiness for the first launch, Hart said.

"The hardware and software performed excellently, just perfectly. But more to the point, the teams and the orchestration of the overall effort went like clockwork," he said. "We have a ground ops team, we have a mission control team, we have pilots and launch engineers, and of course engineering support. What was really impressive to me was just how well the teams in this new environment, with new communication protocols, how they supported each other and coordinated. It was a beautifully orchestrated day.

"Coming into the day, we had all the parts done," Hart said. "At the end of the day, we had a launch system."

Last year, Virgin Orbit completed a series of flights of the carrier jet with a test version of the LauncherOne rocket, culminating in a drop of the inert rocket over Edwards Air Force Base, California. The rocket was filled with water to simulate the weight of a fully-fueled LauncherOne vehicle, and the test unit impacted the ground at Edwards after the 747 pilots command its release.

At the time, the company aimed to perform its first test launch before the end of 2019.

"The areas wh ere programs usually slow down is wh ere components come into systems," Hart said. "It is very difficult to foresee what complexities or difficulties will appear during those. Whether it's our first captive carry test last year, or our stage hotfire test, you can't go through any of those system activities until everything is done, so anything that's either got a problem, a new analytical result, a component failure, a software problem, any of those at that point stops you.

"Those are the areas wh ere you just have to put your head down with the team and burn through those, foresee as many as you can, and the ones that pop up in the 11th hour, drive through," he said ."I'm happy to say that the team has had the wherewithal and perseverance and resilience to drive through a ton of those to get us to wh ere we are today."

Hart said Virgin Orbit has its launch license from the Federal Aviation Administration, which reviewed the company's planned use of an autonomous flight termination system. The destruct mechanism would be used to terminate the flight if the rocket deviates from its expected trajectory after launch.

For launch tracking, Virgin Orbit will use its own telemetry station at the company's Long Beach headquarters, along with other  telemetry stations in Baja California, Antarctica and Mauritius, Hart said. U.S. military launch range facilities at nearby Vandenberg Air Force Base will not play an active role in the test launch.

"A lot of the focus of this system is the flexibility," Hart said. "We wanted to ... make sure that it was as self-contained as possible and that we weren't slave to a lot of assets that have a lot of different stakeholders, wh ere you can get stopped and started continually.

"So we're flying out of Mojave, we have our own telemetry connections, we have autonomous flight termination, we fly over the water, so the sensitivities associated with those are a bit modulated than if you're starting your rocket flight near a populated area," Hart said. "And the 747 allows us to go a lot of different directions and go to a lot of different orbits."

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Virgin Orbit says it is on the cusp of its first orbital test flight. Credit: Virgin Orbit

On the inaugural LauncherOne test flight, the rocket will carry Virgin Orbit's own "test payloads," Hart said.

"It is an engineering test of the system," Hart said. "Of course, we would love it to get to orbit. The more of the system that we can exercise, the more confidence that we'll have for the next flight. We do know, and we're mindful, that a first flight is not without risk.

"So if we get through captive carry, first stage, into second stage, every single point that we get through closer to orbit, we'll be verifying huge parts of the system," he said. "We're not publishing the exact orbit at this point (for the first flight), but it's a low Earth orbit, significantly de-rated for this first flight."

Hart said Virgin Orbit aims to restart the second stage's NewtonFour engine once in space, validating the rocket's ability to deliver payloads to different orbits on the same mission.

"We're planning to exercise the whole system, so we will be restarting the upper stage," he said. That's in our plan. We have a payload that, if all goes well, we would deploy."

Virgin Orbit has not disclosed any details about the payloads to be launched on the rocket's first flight.

Hart said Virgin Orbit plans to have a chase plane for the launch, and video cameras are mounted on the aircraft and the the LauncherOne vehicle itself to capture the rocket's release from the carrier jet, first stage ignition and climb into space.

But the company does not plan to provide a live webcast for the LauncherOne demonstration flight. Instead, Virgin Orbit will release updates on social media as the flight progresses, Hart said.

"On this flight, we'll have updates," he said. "I don't think we'll have continuous video for this first launch. But we'll be pushing things out as far as how we're doing in ground processing, wh ere we are in taxiing, and how we're doing as we go through the flight."

Hart said Virgin Orbit is looking at producing live video streams for the public on future missions.

"It's just, for this first one, there's so much for us to track and get our arms around, it adds another level of complexity that we just didn't want to get into," Hart said.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit‏ @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 28 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1257718987669901313)

It's been humbling to see LauncherOne take shape over time as our team meticulously works through these increasingly complex engineering challenges. Last week's LOX wet dress rehearsal was beautifully executed, so we'll continue to move with gusto toward our Launch Demo. (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png)

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/141176.png)

MAY 7, 2020

VOX SPACE READIES TO LAUNCH FROM ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE IN GUAM

Newly Signed CSOSA Annex Creates Baseline for Virgin Orbit to Fly First Space Launch from Guam

El Segundo, California — May 7, 2020 — VOX Space, the Virgin Orbit subsidiary which provides responsive and affordable launch services for the U.S. national security community, has signed a new agreement with the Department of the Air Force, allowing the company's LauncherOne system to conduct missions to space from Andersen Air Force Base in Guam. VOX Space President Mandy Vaughn and U.S. Air Force 36thWing Commander Brig. Gen. Gentry Boswell, signed the Commercial Space Operations Support Agreement (COSOSA) Annex in early April, setting the stage for the STP-27VP mission, VOX Space's first launch from Andersen Air Force Base.

Virgin Orbit and VOX Space first expressed interest in launching from the Pacific island of Guam in mid-2019. Due to Guam's low latitude and clear launch trajectories in almost all directions, the company's uniquely mobile LauncherOne system can effectively serve all orbital inclinations, such as delivering up to 450kg to a 500km equatorial orbit.

The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) Space Test Program (STP) procured the STP-27VP launch with VOX Space under the Rapid Agile Launch Initiative (RALI), leveraging the Defense Innovation Unit's (DIU) Other Transaction Agreement. One of the first missions to fly on LauncherOne, the STP-27VP manifest consists of several CubeSats from various government agencies performing experiments and technology demonstrations for the DoD.

"We're very grateful to Brig. Gen. Deanna Burt and her team at HQ USSF/S3, as well as Wing Commander Brig. Gen. Boswell, Vice Commander Col. Matthew Nicholson, and all of the excellent airmen and women of the 36thWing and Pacific Air Forces for their support," said VOX Space President Mandy Vaughn. "Lt. Gen. John Thompson and his team at the Space and Missile Systems Center have also provided visionary leadership throughout this process. We're very excited to demonstrate the flexibility and mobility that only LauncherOne can offer."

Because the system is not tied to a traditional ground-based launch site, LauncherOne will leverage key locations around the world including Guam to provide responsive and affordable flights to space for a broad variety of customers. Even now, VOX Space and Virgin Orbit are working closely with multiple allied governments and international organizations interested in establishing launch capabilities closer to home.

After successfully demonstrating all major vehicle assemblies and completing an extensive flight test program, the Virgin Orbit team is in the midst of final preparations for an orbital launch demonstration expected soon.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29897.png) Chris B - NSF‏ @NASASpaceflight (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight) 6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/1263141644486000640)

Virgin Orbit is preparing to conduct the Demo launch of LauncherOne!

"We have a window open for several hours per day this coming weekend, and are meeting now to determine when we plan on making the first attempt" - Virgin Orbit.

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Цитата: undefinedAnnouncing the Window for Our Launch Demo

MAY 20, 2020

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We are extremely excited to announce that the window for our Launch Demo mission starts on Sunday, May 24^th, and extends through Monday, May 25^th, with an opportunity to launch from 10 A.M. – 2 P.M. Pacific (17:00 – 21:00 GMT) each day.

That means that this weekend, our 747 carrier aircraft Cosmic Girl will prepare to take off from Mojave Air and Space Port, fly out over the Pacific ocean, and release our two-stage, orbital rocket, LauncherOne — which will then proceed to ignite its engine in mid-air for the first time.

This Launch Demo marks the apex of a five-year-long development program. On our journey to open up space for everyone we've conducted hundreds of hotfires of our engines and our rocket stages, performed two dozen test flights with our carrier aircraft, and conducted countless other tests of every bit of the system we could test on the ground. 

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Launching from the Earth to space is mind-bogglingly difficult. Thousands of components all need to function as planned while controlling high energy and flying at incredibly fast speeds. The vehicle's structures must be robust enough to tolerate traveling at up to 18,000 mph without disintegrating; the temperatures and pressures of its propellants can't be too high or too low; every internal valve must click open and closed in perfect synchronicity...  There's a long list of factors that need to line up in order to make it all the way. We're mindful of the fact that for the governments and companies who have preceded us in developing spaceflight systems, maiden flights have statistically ended in failure about half of the time.

In the future, the goal of our launches will be to deploy satellites for a new generation of space-based services. For this Launch Demo, though, our goal is to safely learn as much as possible and prove out the LauncherOne system we've worked so hard to design, build, test and operate.

The instant our Newton Three engine ignites, we will have done something no one has ever done before — lighting an orbital-class, liquid-fueled, horizontally-launched vehicle in flight. Once we reach an altitude of 50 miles it will be the first time this kind of launch system will have ever done so.

We'll continue the mission for as long as we can. The longer LauncherOne flies, the more data we'll be able to collect. Should we defy the historical odds and become one of those exceedingly rare teams to complete a mission on first attempt, we will deploy a test payload into an orbit, take our data, and then quickly de-orbit so as not to clutter the heavens.

Regardless of the ultimate conclusion of this Launch Demo, we're excited to learn as much as we can.

We are so grateful to all of you who have followed along with us during this launch campaign — our families, our customers, and all of the others who have cheered us on, offered helpful suggestions, and celebrated the goal of bringing a new type of launch service into fruition. We look forward to sharing more on flight day. For near real-time updates follow us on Twitter (@Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/virgin_orbit)).  See you on launch day!

Цитата: undefined20 МАЯ, 21:49
CNBC: Virgin Orbit планирует испытать в США систему воздушного старта ракеты
По данным телеканала, испытания могут пройти 23, 24 или 25 мая


НЬЮ-ЙОРК, 20 мая. /ТАСС/. Компания Virgin Orbit британского миллиардера Ричарда Брэнсона планирует в предстоящие выходные испытать над Тихим океаном систему воздушного запуска ракет-носителей, предназначенных для вывода спутников на орбиту Земли. Об этом сообщил в среду телеканал CNBC (https://www.cnbc.com/) со ссылкой на Virgin Orbit.

Испытание намечено на 13:00 по времени Восточного побережья США (20:00 мск) и может состояться 23 мая, 24 мая или 25 мая. Окончательное решение о конкретной дате пока не принято.

План испытания предусматривает отделение ракеты от модифицированного самолета Boeing 747, который вылетит из космопорта в пустыне Мохаве (штат Калифорния) и совершит полет над Тихим океаном. В июле прошлого года экипаж самолета осуществил сброс носителя с металлическими болванками, водой и антифризом для придания необходимой массы. В этот раз ракета будет нести топливо и в автоматическом режиме запустит собственные двигатели после сброса.

В Virgin Orbit информировали телеканал, что на прошлой неделе в рамках подготовки к испытанию экипаж Boeing 747 поднимался в воздух с ракетой с топливом. Подготовка не предусматривала сброс носителя и его старт в воздухе.

Спойлер

Другая компания Брэнсона Virgin Galactic 1 мая провела первое летное испытание в небе над штатом Нью-Мексико космолета Unity серии SpaceShipTwo. Unity стартовал на высоте 15,2 км, отделившись от самолета-носителя Eve, и совершил планирующий полет, приземлившись в космопорте в Нью-Мексико. Аппарат развил скорость в 0,7 Маха. Космолеты серии SpaceShipTwo разрабатывались для выполнения регулярных туристических суборбитальных полетов.

[свернуть]

Цитата: undefined21 МАЯ, 10:01
Virgin Orbit 24 мая проведет испытания орбитальной ракеты в воздухе над Тихим океаном
Предстоящее демонстрационное испытание готовилось пять лет

НЬЮ-ЙОРК, 21 мая. /ТАСС/. Компания Virgin Orbit британского миллиардера Ричарда Брэнсона планирует 24 мая провести над Тихим океаном демонстрационное испытание системы воздушного запуска ракеты-носителя, предназначенной для вывода спутников на орбиту Земли. Как сообщила Virgin Orbit в среду, она впервые попытается отправить ракету таким способом в космос.


Испытание намечено на ближайшее воскресенье и при неблагоприятных обстоятельствах будет перенесено на 25 мая. В обоих случаях временное окно открывается в 10:00 по времени Западного побережья США (20:00 мск) и закрывается через четыре часа. "Это означает, что самолет Boeing 747 под названием "Космическая девушка" будет подготовлен к тому, чтобы подняться в воздух из космопорта в пустыне Мохаве, совершить полет над Тихим океаном и сбросить орбитальную ракету LauncherOne, состоящую из двух ступеней. Ракета затем впервые запустит двигатель в воздухе", - пояснила компания.

Предстоящее демонстрационное испытание готовилось пять лет. Virgin Orbit за это время провела сотни огневых испытаний ракетных двигателей, два десятка испытательных полетов модернизированного "Боинга-747" и бесчисленное количество тестов узлов и элементов системы воздушного старта. В июле прошлого года экипаж самолета осуществил сброс носителя с металлическими болванками, водой и антифризом для придания необходимой массы. В этот раз ракета будет заправлена топливом и в автоматическом режиме запустит собственные двигатели после сброса.

Virgin Orbit отдает себе отчет, что летные испытания схожих систем, осуществленные правительственными организациями и частными компаниями, статистически заканчивались провалом на середине отпущенного времени. В данном случае задача заключается в том, чтобы носитель пролетел как можно дольше, позволив бортовым приборам собрать как можно больше полезной информации. В случае успешного выхода в космос LauncherOne выведет на орбиту экспериментальный груз и сойдет с орбиты, чтобы не создавать помех другим аппаратам.

Спойлер

Другая компания Брэнсона Virgin Galactic 1 мая провела первое летное испытание в небе над штатом Нью-Мексико космолета Unity серии SpaceShipTwo. Unity стартовал на высоте 15,2 км, отделившись от самолета-носителя Eve, и совершил планирующий полет, приземлившись в космопорте в Нью-Мексико. Аппарат развил скорость в 0,7 Маха. Космолеты серии SpaceShipTwo разрабатывались для выполнения регулярных туристических суборбитальных полетов.

[свернуть]

Цитата: undefinedPress Release
Virgin Orbit Makes The Inflight Connection with Panasonic Avionics
05/21/20

Panasonic Avionics Corporation (Panasonic) has been selected by Virgin Orbit to provide inflight connectivity for its airborne rocket launch platform.

Panasonic's latest generation high-speed inflight connectivity system has been installed on Cosmic Girl, the modified Boeing 747-400 that serves as the carrier aircraft for Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne system. Virgin Orbit is currently undergoing final rehearsals for an orbital launch demonstration expected soon.

The inflight connectivity service will enable Virgin Orbit to monitor the health of the launch system over land and sea. The high bandwidth capacity of Panasonic's connectivity network will ensure Virgin Orbit's mission control center can quickly and easily communicate with the rocket prior to launch.

Ken Sain, Chief Executive Officer of Panasonic Avionics Corporation, says, "Virgin Orbit is set to deliver an exciting step forward in satellite launching technology, and we are thrilled to support their vision with our inflight connectivity."

"Panasonic Avionics' proven inflight connectivity services are used by airlines around the world to provide operational connectivity for not just passengers, but aircraft and their systems, and we look forward to supporting Virgin Orbit by providing a critical live link between air and ground."

Virgin Orbit builds and operates the most flexible and responsive satellite launcher ever invented: LauncherOne, a dedicated launch service for commercial and government-built small satellites.

LauncherOne rockets are designed and manufactured in Long Beach, California, and will be air-launched from Virgin Orbit's modified Boeing 747-400 carrier aircraft – allowing it to operate from locations all over the world in order to best serve each customer's needs.

"We designed LauncherOne to be more mobile and flexible than any other platform out there, and that's required us to implement innovative, cutting-edge solutions throughout the system. We're grateful to Panasonic Avionics for their support — helping us keep eyes on our flight crew, Cosmic Girl, and the rocket as we fly out to our launch point. We're certainly looking forward to having this technology in action during our upcoming launch demo," said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart.

– Ends –

Цитата: undefinedKZLA

A0930/20 - DCC LAUNCHERONE F1 STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS
3314N11953W TO 3253N11931W TO 3249N11928W TO 3248N11927W TO 3142N11855W TO 3132N11915W TO 3255N11952W TO 3257N11953W TO POINT OF ORIGIN.
SFC - UNL, 23 MAY 17:00 2020 UNTIL 23 MAY 21:00 2020.
CREATED: 20 MAY 12:28 2020

05/150 (A0943/20) - AIRSPACE DCC LAUNCHERONEF1 STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS
3314N11953W TO 3253N11931W TO 3249N11928W TO 3248N11927W TO 3142N11855W TO 3132N11915W TO 3255N11952W TO 3257N11953W TO POINT OF ORIGIN.
SFC-UNL. 24 MAY 17:00 2020 UNTIL 24 MAY 21:00 2020.
CREATED: 21 MAY 11:25 2020

Цитата: undefinedNAVAREA XII 217/20

EASTERN NORTH PACIFIC.
CALIFORNIA.
1. HAZARDOUS OPERATIONS, ROCKET LAUNCHING
    231700Z TO 232100Z MAY,
    ALTERNATE 241700Z TO 242100Z MAY AND
    251700Z TO 252100Z MAY IN AREAS BOUND BY:
A. 28-10-35N 117-47-52W, 28-11-04N 117-18-46W,
    32-45-48N 119-23-34W, 33-08-27N 119-37-00W,
    33-05-38N 120-01-04W, 31-26-15N 119-13-29W.
B. 23-40-22N 115-41-11W, 22-39-51N 115-52-53W,
    21-54-40N 115-31-38W, 21-33-36N 114-47-51W,
    22-17-17N 114-31-23W, 22-55-31N 114-54-47W.
2. CANCEL THIS MSG 252200Z MAY 20.//

Authority: VIRGIN ORBIT, LLC 200012Z MAY 20.

Date: 200031Z MAY 20
Cancel: 25220000 May 20

Цитата: undefinedVirgin Orbit schedules its first orbital test launch this weekend
May 21, 2020 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/05/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/145636.jpg)
A full-scale mock-up of Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne rocket falls away from a modified Boeing 747 carrier jet during an inert drop test in July 2019 over the Mojave Desert of California. Credit: Virgin Orbit

The first orbital test flight of Virgin Orbit's privately-developed air-launched rocket is scheduled as soon as Sunday off the coast of Southern California, the company said Wednesday.

Designed to deliver small satellites into orbit, the LauncherOne vehicle has a four-hour window Sunday opening at 10 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. EDT; 1700 GMT) to head into space after release from the belly of Virgin Orbit's Boeing 747 carrier aircraft. A backup launch opportunity is available at the same time Monday.

"We will only proceed with the mission if all conditions for launch are nominal," Virgin Orbit said in a press kit for the demonstration flight. "Although air-launched systems like ours are less vulnerable to bad weather than fixed ground-launch systems, we'll be watching the weather closely and being cautious for this maiden flight."

Virgin Orbit announced the target launch date Wednesday as the company nears the final phase of an eight-year development effort that began as a spinoff of sister company Virgin Galactic, which focuses on the suborbital space tourism market.

Both companies are part of Richard Branson's Virgin Group. The LauncherOne vehicle aims to become the first liquid-fueled air-launched rocket to reach orbit.

Virgin Galactic says it first studied the LauncherOne concept in 2007, and development began in earnest in 2012. Engineers in 2015 scrapped initial plans to drop the rocket from Virgin Galactic's WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft, and kicked off development of a redesigned system using a 747 jumbo jet taken from Virgin Atlantic's commercial airline fleet.

Headquartered in Long Beach, California, Virgin Orbit was established in 2017 as a spinoff of Virgin Galactic.

"This Launch Demo marks the apex of a five-year-long development program," Virgin Orbit said in a statement. "On our journey to open up space for everyone, we've conducted hundreds of hotfires of our engines and our rocket stages, performed two dozen test flights with our carrier aircraft, and conducted countless other tests of every bit of the system we could test on the ground."

In the last six weeks, Virgin Orbit completed a captive carry test of the LauncherOne rocket. Teams filled the vehicle with kerosene fuel and cryogenic liquid nitrogen, a stand-in for liquid oxygen used as an oxidizer during a real launch, and the 747 carrier aircraft — named "Cosmic Girl" — took off from Virgin Orbit's flight operations base at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California.

Virgin Orbit exercised propellant loading, takeoff, tracking and telemetry, and return-to-base procedures during the captive carry test April 12. The company completed additional rehearsals on the ground in recent weeks, practicing filling and draining the rocket's supply of kerosene and liquid oxygen.

Now the rocket is ready to fly, Virgin Orbit said this week.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/150043.jpg)
Virgin Orbit's rocket carrier aircraft sits near the runway at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, where teams will fill the LauncherOne vehicle with liquid propellants before takeoff. Credit: Virgin Orbit

Dan Hart, Virgin Orbit's CEO, told Spaceflight Now last month the LauncherOne's first flight will carry some "test payloads" the company developed. He said Virgin Orbit will release details about the payloads on the inaugural launch at a later time.

Hart characterized the first flight as "an engineering test."

"Of course, we would love it to get to orbit," Hart told Spaceflight Now. "The more of the system that we can exercise, the more confidence that we'll have for the next flight. We do know, and we're mindful, that a first flight is not without risk."

"We're mindful of the fact that for the governments and companies who have preceded us in developing spaceflight systems, maiden flights have statistically ended in failure about half of the time," Virgin Orbit said in a statement Wednesday.

"In the future, the goal of our launches will be to deploy satellites for a new generation of space-based services," the company said. "For this Launch Demo, though, our goal is to safely learn as much as possible and prove out the LauncherOne system we've worked so hard to design, build, test and operate."

Piloted by Kelly Latimer, Virgin Orbit's chief test pilot, the 747 carrier aircraft will line up for its launch run west of San Nicolas Island, which is owned by the U.S. Navy. The targeted drop point is located roughly 100 miles (160 kilometers) west-southwest of Long Beach.

Latimer will command the airplane onto climb angle of more than 25 degrees. The nearly 30-ton rocket will be released from a pylon under the 747's left wing during the pull-up maneuver at an altitude of around 35,000 feet (nearly 10,700 meters).

Around five seconds after release, the rocket's kerosene-fueled NewtonThree engine will ignite with 73,500 pounds of thrust to begin climbing into orbit.

"The instant our NewtonThree engine ignites, we will have done something no one has ever done before — lighting an orbital-class, liquid-fueled, horizontally-launched vehicle in flight," Virgin Orbit said.

"We'll continue the mission for as long as we can," the company said. "The longer LauncherOne flies, the more data we'll be able to collect. Should we defy the historical odds and become one of those exceedingly rare teams to complete a mission on first attempt, we will deploy a test payload into an orbit, take our data, and then quickly de-orbit so as not to clutter the heavens."

If everything goes as Virgin Orbit hopes, the company intends to restart the second stage's NewtonFour engine once in space, validating the rocket's ability to deliver payloads to different orbits on the same mission.

The mission profile for the first LauncherOne flight lasts 32 minutes from the time of the rocket's release from the "Cosmic Girl" jumbo jet until separation of its payload in orbit.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/150062.jpg)
After takeoff from Mojave, the "Cosmic Girl" carrier jet will fly to the west, then south over the Channel Islands off the coast of Southern California. Once over the Pacific Ocean, the aircraft will fly in a racetrack pattern before lining up on the rocket's southeasterly flight path. Release of the rocket is expected about 50 minutes after takeoff from Mojave. Credit: Virgin Orbit

The 70-foot-long (21-meter) LauncherOne rocket is designed to compete with other commercial smallsat launchers, such as Rocket Lab's Electron booster, for contracts to deliver CubeSats and microsatellites to orbit for commercial customers, the U.S. military and NASA. Virgin Orbit says it can haul up to 660 pounds (300 kilograms) of cargo into a 310-mile-high (500-kilometer) polar sun-synchronous orbit, a standard operating orbit for Earth-imaging satellites.

A dedicated launch by Virgin Orbit sells for around $12 million.

Hart said last month that Virgin Orbit plans to have a chase plane for the launch, and video cameras are mounted on the aircraft and the the LauncherOne vehicle itself to capture the rocket's release from the carrier jet, first stage ignition and climb into space.

But the company does not plan to provide a live public webcast for the LauncherOne demonstration flight. Instead, Virgin Orbit will release updates on Twitter as the mission progresses.

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) Virgin Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 4 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1264523127809118210)

We completed fueling of our LauncherOne rocket yesterday for our Launch Demo. Everything has been proceeding smoothly: team, aircraft, & rocket are in excellent shape. However, we have one sensor that is acting up. Out of an abundance of caution, we are offloading fuel to address


4 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1264523241428627456)

This means we are scrubbed for today. Currently, it appears we've got a straightforward path to address this minor sensor issue and recycle quickly. The crew are already hard at work putting that plan into action. We'll provide an update on the new launch target later today.

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit 26 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1264960235015270401)

The way that we support and launch our rocket is quite different from vertically launched platforms, so here's a handy guide to the various trailers that make up our mobile ground support equipment.

https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1264960138017771521/pu/vid/1280x720/QzA0bZusbZIayx2u.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1264960138017771521/pu/vid/1280x720/QzA0bZusbZIayx2u.mp4) (2:00)

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) Virgin Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) @Virgin_Orbit (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit) 7 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1265023753970302976)

In this first launch demo, we successfully completed all of our pre-launch procedures, captive carry flight out to the drop site, clean telemetry lock from multiple dishes, a smooth pass through the racetrack, terminal count, and a clean release from the aircraft.


7 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1265023835478175745)

LauncherOne maintained stability after release, and we ignited our first stage engine, NewtonThree. An anomaly then occurred early in first stage flight. We'll learn more as our engineers analyze the mountain of data we collected today.


6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1265023986674462720)

As we said before the flight, our goals today were to work through the process of conducting a launch, learn as much as we could, and achieve ignition. We hoped we could have done more, but we accomplished those key objectives today.


6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1265024057163968512)

The team's already hard at work digging into the data, and we're eager to hop into our next big test ASAP. Thankfully, instead of waiting until after our 1st flight to tackle our 2nd rocket, we've already completed a ton of work to get us back in the air and keep moving forward.

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit 6 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1265024136604037120)

Here's our next rocket, built and ready for system-level testing in our final integration area as it waits for its turn to fly to space.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/182548.jpg)

Цитата: DiZed от 25.05.2020 23:16:09https://nplus1.ru/news/2020/05/25/launcherone-mission-one

"После сброса с самолета Virgin Orbit заявила в Twitter (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1265008105714155520), что ракета закончила полет вскоре после запуска, но самолет с экипажем находятся в безопасности и возвращаются на аэродром."

Цитата: Старый от 26.05.2020 01:23:42Может кто-нибудь внятно объяснить как ракета "закончила полёт" то?

Цитироватьракета закончила полет вскоре после запуска

Цитата: undefinedMission Recap: Launch Demo

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220411.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

26 мая 2020 г.

Mission Recap: Launch Demo

We said the main product of this flight would be data, and wow, did we get a lot of it! After diving into our early analyses, we wanted to share more about the flight — including both the many things that went well and what we know about the areas where we'll need to improve.

Check out our newest blog post for a more thorough recap of the flight, and to see where we're headed next as a team more excited than ever about the utility of our launch system.

Цитата: undefinedMission Recap: Our First Launch Demo

MAY 27, 2020
TECHNICAL UPDATES (https://virginorbit.com/category/technical-updates/)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNJib8lJY1E (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNJib8lJY1E)

As we've delved into the data from yesterday's flight, the more we see, the happier we get. We've taken an enormous step forward as a team, and we wanted to share more about the flight, including both the many things that went well and what we know about the areas where we'll need to improve.

The context of everything that happened before the release of the rocket is incredibly important, and we'll describe that in detail below. But we won't make you wait for the part that's of most interest.

WHAT HAPPENED?

For about 9 seconds after drop, the flight went perfectly. Through some of the most challenging portions of our flight — release, the controlled drop, the rocket's ignition sequence, and the initial portion of guided, powered flight — every part of our system did exactly as we designed it to do. We have solid data from hundreds of channels and sensors — and in looking at those, we see performance that is well-matched to our predictions and to the extensive data we have from our models and ground tests. This means that we have proved out via flight the foundational principles of our air-launch operations, which is the key thing that separates us from our peers in the industry.

About 9 seconds after drop, something malfunctioned, causing the booster stage engine to extinguish, which in turn ended the mission. We cannot yet say conclusively what the malfunction was or what caused it, but we feel confident we have sufficient data to determine that as we continue through the rigorous investigation we've already begun. With the engine extinguished, the vehicle was no longer able to maintain controlled flight — but the rocket did not explode. It stayed within the predicted downrange corridors of our projections and our Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) launch license as the vehicle fell to the ocean, posing no risk to public safety, no danger our aircrew or aircraft, and no significant environmental impact.

SO, WHAT DID THIS LAUNCH DEMONSTRATION PROVE?

Our Launch Demo was the world's first attempted orbital launch from Mojave Air and Space Port. One of the core capabilities we've been working to develop is the idea of a truly mobile launch infrastructure — and yesterday, we completely demonstrated that capability. The infrastructure LauncherOne requires is dramatically different from any existing launch system. For this launch demo, all we needed from the airport was a small plot of land at the end of a taxiway and access to a runway.  Everything else we brought in ourselves — coming in on local roads or on our carrier aircraft itself. This low infrastructure footprint is the key to truly responsive launch and a new kind of global launch capability. And we've now proven it works.

As part of that, we have proven out our own fully transportable ground operating system. All of the trailers that we use to transport our rocket, mate it to our carrier aircraft, fuel and pressurize it, and service our payload were transported by public roads to the spaceport. Indeed, even some of our most critical ground stations for receiving telemetry were driven and parked in place. Again, this proves out our ability to quickly bring our launch capability wherever it is needed — a whole new category of launch service. Our Launch Demo was also conducted under a Commercial Space Transportation License issued by the FAA, the first time we have ever operated under such a license. Furthermore, this launch was conducted independent of the U.S. federal ranges, important national institutions that can nevertheless impart significant cost and schedule impacts on traditional launches. Apart from coordinating the airspace, our system is beholden to no one's schedules other than our customers', our own, and Mother Nature's.

One key technology that is required in order to move away from reliance on those federal ranges is an extremely robust autonomous flight safety system. While rockets traditionally rely on complex ground systems at the ranges to monitor the flight and terminate the mission if the flight ever goes out of the approved launch corridor, the new generation of launch vehicles are doing this job autonomously. Yesterday, our rocket demonstrated its capability to correctly know when we are in that corridor and when we are not — something we verify during our "cold pass" prior to dropping the rocket. Thankfully, this system was not needed during yesterday's mission, but it functioned perfectly throughout the flight.

When Cosmic Girl and LauncherOne took off from the runway at Mojave Air and Space Port just before noon yesterday, that marked our first flight with cryogenic liquid oxygen loaded into the rocket — and only our second ever flight with cryogenic materials on board. Capping an extensive campaign of ground testing, this milestone allowed us to prove out key aspects of the technology behind our linerless composite tanks, which held up to the loads of flight under the wing of a widebody jetliner and the release maneuver while carrying a full load of cryogenic oxidizer.

After a swift flight out to the drop point and a cold pass around our racetrack — the planned loop where we ensure the system autonomously detects when it enters and exits the allowable launch corridor, in addition to verifying telemetry locks — we entered into and executed a terminal count for the first time outside of dress rehearsals. A universal aerospace practice that has been made famous by countless documentaries and films, the terminal count is the final sequence of checks and polls that culminate in a rocket's ignition and flight. These countdowns always require an uncompromising level of precision, communication, and choreography — and our team pulled it off without a hiccup, hold, or scrub.

As the terminal count approached zero, our carrier aircraft went into our pitch-up maneuver, climbing steeply and achieving a flight path angle of about 30 degrees. Exactly on cue, we cleanly released the LauncherOne rocket from the pylon under the wing of our 747. As planned, the aircraft quickly banked away from the rocket. The rocket itself flew gracefully, with complete control, perfectly matching our predictions and further validating our aerodynamic models.

A few seconds after drop, the rocket trigged its ignition sequence. On our first ever attempt, we achieved in-air ignition and steady state-operation of our main stage rocket engine. The use of liquid-fueled rocket engines for air-launched vehicles is almost unheard of outside of legendary programs like the X-1 and X-15; and indeed, no one before us had ever completed such an ignition of an orbital-class rocket engine.

Once the engine ignited, our guidance and control system controlled the rocket in powered flight and steered it along its trajectory, all as predicted by our 6-DOF analysis.

Each of these items is a huge achievement for our team, and we are thrilled to have accomplished so many of them in our first launch demo mission.

WHAT NEXT?

With more confidence than ever in our design philosophy and the utility of our one-of-a-kind launch system, we're determined to reach space as soon as humanly possible. Clearly, we have things to learn and something to fix, but our engineers, technicians, and flight crew have taken a moment to celebrate and are now precisely and thoroughly dissecting the data.

Meanwhile, our integration team is hard at work preparing our next rocket, and the one after that, and several more. If hardware changes are needed, we'll be able to make them quickly, thanks to our vertically integrated, state-of-the-art rocket factory. And if we decide we want to run a few experiments, well, we've got a factory full of flight hardware we can use for whatever tests we need.

It's too soon to say exactly when our next launch demo will occur. But we can confidently say that we laid the groundwork long ago for us to build on this launch demo quickly and skillfully. We're excited to take the next step on our journey to open space for good.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 27.05.2020 19:55:20"Гасление двигателя" (перевод Гугля), значит... Ну-ну...

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67522.jpg) Thomas Burghardt @TGMetsFan98 23 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/TGMetsFan98/status/1281614180051820548)

An FCC filing for launch communications indicates that Virgin Orbit's second orbital launch attempt with LauncherOne could be targeted for this fall. The requested period of operation begins September 1.
https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/STA_Print.cfm?mode=current&application_seq=101178 (https://t.co/WrsRO2f5kn?amp=1)

Цитата: cross-track от 27.05.2020 21:04:54Вашу подпись Гугл тоже забавно переводит)

Lingua latina non penis canina
Латинский язык без пениса

Цитата: undefinedПо поводу аварии 25 мая
...
«У нас был отказ компонентов в нашей системе двигателя. Это была линия подачи высокого давления», - сказал он. Жидкий кислород «перестал попадать в двигатель, и наш полет был прекращен».

Компания провела расследование и определила, что нужно исправить в двигателе, чтобы усилить неисправные компоненты. Вторая ракета LauncherOne находится в окончательной интеграции прямо сейчас и покинет завод в ближайшие несколько недель, пока продолжаются модификации двигателя. «Мы будем ориентироваться на наш следующий рейс до конца года»
...

Цитировать

Wrapping Up Our First Launch Demo, and Looking Ahead to Launch Demo 2

AUGUST 3, 2020  ●  FEATURED (https://virginorbit.com/category/featured/)/TECHNICAL UPDATES (https://virginorbit.com/category/technical-updates/)

This past Memorial Day, Virgin Orbit took a major step forward as a company and conducted our first Launch Demo. As you've read before, (https://virginorbit.com/mission-recap-our-first-launch-demo/) we built on years of design and preparation to step into our first launch campaign; and on our very first attempt, our team pulled off a picture-perfect loading operation, take-off, captive carry, terminal count, release, and ignition, and achieved powered flight. It was a smooth operation, thanks to the intense focus of an incredibly talented team.

You've also seen that that during our first stage flight, our main rocket engine shut down prematurely, bringing our experimental flight to an end — but only after we had demonstrated all of the key technologies of a truly unique air-launched spaceflight system, differentiating our launch system from every other system on the market.

Within minutes of our flight crew safely touching down at the Mojave Air and Space Port, our full attention turned to an investigation of all of the copious data from the flight. We had worked hard to ensure we'd have a mountain of data from that demonstration flight, and with our highly instrumented vehicle feeding data down to four ground stations, plus additional information from our carrier aircraft and chase plane, that work paid off.

Although we'd hoped to truly defy the odds and make orbit in our very first test, we were still thrilled to have reached milestones that only a small handful of others have ever gotten to celebrate. But we didn't spend too much time partying it up. By the evening of the same day, we were deep into the process of both celebrating the wins and how closely performance matched prediction and, of course, figuring out why our main engine had shut down, ending the flight.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196309.gif)

RESULTS FROM OUR INVESTIGATION

We knew the odds of getting to orbit on our first attempt were slim well before our wheels started to roll down the tarmac, and so we were ready for any outcome. We had our plans ready and an investigation team identified before the countdown began. So as soon as the flight concluded, we were able to get started. To ensure we left no stone unturned in our quest for answers, we added strong independent voices to the team, calling upon industry legends Jim Sponnick and Mark Wilkins as well as the world-class team at the Aerospace Corporation to give us their straight-up advice and opinions along the way.

Soon, we were able to identify the cause of the failure that ended our first Launch Demo: a breach in the high-pressure line carrying cryogenic Liquid Oxygen (LOX) to our first stage combustion chamber due to a component failure. Without a supply of oxidizer, that engine soon stopped providing thrust, ending our powered flight and ultimately the test itself.

In the business of launch vehicles, finding the direct cause of any failure of any flight is incredibly important, but certainly not sufficient. In order to truly get to the root of the issue, it is important to ask why after why after why.  If the answer to the first why is "because the high-pressure LOX line failed," then the second why must be "why did it fail?" That in turn must be followed by more whys— including "why didn't we anticipate this failure," "why wasn't this failure observed in our earlier testing," and more. To all of these, you must add in a healthy dose of "what else could have happened," "what would this failure have looked like if it occurred at a different point in the mission," and hundreds more questions. Creating a robust fault tree or fishbone diagram is important, especially for those visual learners.

In the two months since that milestone test, we've asked ourselves those questions and our team has come up with clear insights and answers. Engineers, technicians, and inspectors have been working hand-in-hand (well, the COVID-19 equivalent of hand-in-hand) to validate those answers. We've put our hardware through a punishing barrage of tests to shake out any hidden surprises that might otherwise doom us to repeat the mishap.

Now, we're putting the finishing touches on that investigation; and while we aren't quite done, the major findings and the corrective actions are clear — and we're well under way with fabricating new parts and putting those actions into play.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196310.jpg)

CHANGES AND IMPROVEMENTS

In implementing tweaks to LauncherOne for our next flight, we've taken a "belt and suspenders" approach; that is to say, fixing the obvious issues we observed, and also proactively addressing issues we didn't observe but fall into the realm of possible contributors.

A battery of tests of our components and systems has enabled us to re-anchor our understanding of the physical stresses and leak paths in the system, and to reassess the design and the operation of every component. On the basis of those results, we are strengthening parts of our high-pressure LOX feed system and increasing some of the operating margins with an eye towards maximizing robustness and reliability.

We're also able to safely pass on more good news about the system to our customers.

One of the datasets that pleased us the most from our first Launch Demo was what we saw in terms of the vibrations that satellites riding on our rocket will experience. Our structural dynamics engineers are by nature a fairly conservative group, and have been appropriately cautious with all of their analyses, especially when it comes to our customers' precious cargo. Our analysts need proof before they will remove uncertainty. Last year, they updated their projections based upon our flight test campaign; now, thanks to the insight earned from our Launch Demo, they have further reduced our random vibration environment predictions. After years of under-promising on that front, we're pleased now to state with the confidence only afforded by flight data that we'll provide our customers a gentle ride.

Of course, after an intense journey to first launch, and all the lessons learned and teamwork along the way, it must be said that the biggest improvements in the system between Launch Demo and Launch Demo 2 will be the improvements to ourselves. We've always felt we have the best team in the business, and the skills and the perseverance of our team really shone through in what we accomplished in May. It takes a lot to smoothly, professionally move through a fully automated countdown, transfer control of the system to a small crew of four on our 747, execute a picture-perfect release, and more, and none of that happens by accident. But the experience of the whole launch campaign — not just the flight, but the work that led up to it — taught us a lot. Our self-reflections along that road and now our data review has taught us still more.

Our team is now more experienced and better prepared than ever. Our tools and processes have been honed by our first launch campaign. We've experienced both joy and frustration and every emotion in between, and now we're ready for the next chapter.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196311.jpg)

INTRODUCING OUR NEXT MISSION

Although our first Launch Demo proved a lot, the fact is that we clearly did not test all of the portions of the system in flight. As such, we will use our next rocket for a second Launch Demo mission to demonstrate all phases of flight.

Our flight hardware for this mission is in final integration now. We anticipate the fully assembled rocket will leave our Long Beach, CA, factory around Labor Day, when it will head to our Mojave, CA, facility for an onslaught of tests designed to ensure we truly have learned all of the lessons from our first Launch Demo. After that, it will return to our factory for some final tweaks and planned hardware swaps, and then we'll be back at the end of the taxiway at the Mojave Air and Space Port, moving into our second-ever launch campaign.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196313.jpg)

Throughout this process, we've been keeping in close touch with our customers. We believe transparency benefits everyone — which is why we published a detailed flight recap along with video showing the failure within a day of the test flight itself. Open, honest communications are particularly important between a launch provider and their customers.

We love all of our customers equally, but it was especially important for us to remain in close contact with the customer slated to fly on our first operational mission: a little team that you might have heard of called NASA.

NASA has been engaged with our technical team in the run-up to our Launch Demo, during the test itself, and in the time since. We believe it is critical to share the good and the bad alike.

Not too long after our Memorial Day test flight, we called NASA to inform them that our upcoming rocket would be used for our Launch Demo 2 mission, which we anticipated would move their mission to the next rocket on our manifest. NASA, however, was quick to remind us of the fundamental goals of the NASA Venture Class Launch Services program, through which they purchased this launch. Our colleagues at NASA's Launch Services Program (LSP) were glad to have the insight into our plans and appreciated the offer to fly another test prior to their mission, but also assured us that they were ready to get their payloads onboard our Launch Demo 2 flight.

The team was both proud and honored by the thought of flying NASA on our next mission, but we didn't say yes right away. We wanted to be sure we fully understood the risks involved. So, we completed a boatload of analysis, looking at our conclusions from our investigation and our expectations for the next flight in sum. A few weeks later, we landed on a plan.

Accordingly, we are delighted to announce that our Launch Demo 2 mission will carry eleven CubeSats for NASA's CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI).

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196312.jpg)

This mission builds on an excellent relationship we've had with NASA since being selected for the Venture Class Launch Services (VCLS) program back in 2015 (https://www.space.com/30826-nasa-small-satellites-rocket-rides.html). We feel an immense sense of pride to be launching satellites for arguably the world's most preeminent space organization.

What's even cooler to us is what this mission represents. With the spacecraft on this flight built mainly by universities across the U.S., it strikes to the heart of our purpose of opening access to space. We're elated to have a hand in supporting all kinds of interesting new scientific research and technology demonstrations in orbit.

Currently, we are working hard to conduct this launch towards the end of this year — a relatively short timeline for an industry where the average turnaround time between first and second flights of a new system measures up to about a year. Most importantly, we are focused on completing the right technical work so that as many risks as we practically can are retired on the ground. As we've said before, we're out to set new standards for the launch business: in customer service, in flexibility, and in agility. We've got lots of work to do getting ready for flight, but we are making great progress, even in the midst of a pandemic and a mostly virtual workspace.

We'll have more to share about the upcoming Launch Demo 2 mission as we progress towards flight. 

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1296505258131116032)

Because hotfires just hit different at night.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51426.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67571.jpg) Virgin Orbit @Virgin_Orbit 17 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1299050130176262145)

And away we go! As we mentioned in our early August blog, we wanted to get our next rocket out the door to Mojave for testing before the end of the month. This week, with both stages fully integrated, we did just that!

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51539.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51540.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51541.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51542.jpg)


17 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1299050205803769856)

Like its predecessor, this rocket has been installed onto a test stand that simulates the conditions under Cosmic Girl's wing. At the same time, our launch techs are working on activating our mobile ground support equipment and getting it hooked up to the rocket.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51543.jpg)


17 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Virgin_Orbit/status/1299050277299863552)

Soon to come: cryo shocks, fuel loading exercises, procedure rehearsals and more! Once we've wrapped up those exercises, this LauncherOne will head back down to Long Beach for some planned hardware swaps — and then, it'll be time for Launch Demo 2.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/51544.jpg)

Цитировать11:32, 12 октября 2020
Virgin Orbit Ричарда Брэнсона запланировала привлечь до $200 млн от инвесторов

Москва. 12 октября. INTERFAX.RU - Американская Virgin Orbit, которая входит в Virgin Group британского миллиардера Ричарда Брэнсона и запускает спутники, рассчитывает привлечь от инвесторов до $200 млн и получить оценку в $1 млрд, пишет The Wall Street Journal со ссылкой на информированные источники.

По их данным, раунд финансирования, для проведения которого Virgin Orbit привлекла LionTree Advisors и Perella Weinberg Partners, может пройти до конца 2020 года. Компания намерена направить привлеченные средства на капитальные расходы и запуск спутников.

Virgin Orbit, которая планирует выводить на орбиту небольшие спутники, ориентирована как на коммерческих клиентов, так и на государственных. Аналитики считают, что предлагаемый компанией запуск спутников с самолетов дешевле, чем с поверхности земли, однако существуют технические сложности. В мае в ходе первого испытания ракета-носитель Virgin Orbit LauncherOne не смогла достичь орбиты.

По оценке аналитиков, Virgin Orbit уже потратила $400 млн на развитие системы запуска ракет с воздуха.

До пандемии космические стартапы уже испытывали трудности с привлечением финансирования. Прогнозы спроса на запуски упали после вспышки COVID-19, а источники финансирования сократились.

Представители отрасли и аналитики в последнее время отмечают восстановление интереса к отрасли на фоне поддержки американскими военными ведомствами запуска небольших и менее дорогих спутников.

Ричард Брэнсон с начала пандемии уже дважды обращался за помощью к инвесторам на фоне спада в туристической и авиационной отраслях.

В июле авиакомпания Virgin Atlantic договорилась с акционерами о пакете финансовой помощи в размере 1,2 млрд фунтов стерлингов ($1,5 млрд). В октябре Virgin Group привлекла $480 млн с помощью специализированной компании по целевым слияниям и поглощениям.

ЦитироватьReturn to Flight: Launch Demo 2 | Virgin Orbit

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220371.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw) Virgin Orbit (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpz2PZJHMLcK7rH_1oup7Sw)

14 окт. 2020 г.

Our team has really been on their A-game, putting in an incredible amount of work to move quickly and efficiently through the biggest milestones on the path to our second launch demonstration. Hear directly from some of our technical leaders on how we've matured this year, and what exactly we've been up to since our last flight with LauncherOne!

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(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/52581.jpg)

Launch Demo 2: October Update

October 14, 2020

Featured (https://virginorbit.com/category/featured/)/Technical Updates (https://virginorbit.com/category/technical-updates/)

Just three years after Virgin Orbit was born as a company, we took to the skies to conduct our very first Launch Demo with LauncherOne. During that demo, we proved out all of the key technologies for a new kind of launch technology: liquid-fueled air-launch. With the first launch just a few months behind us, we are now smartly driving down the path to Launch Demo 2, which our incredibly talented and determined team is targeting to complete before the end of the year.

That's a pretty quick turnaround by industry standards — so how'd we manage that? Well, the simple answer is that our second launch rocket was already in assembly when the first one flew, along with several other rockets in flow at our state-of-the-art rocket production facility. After all, one launch can make history, but it's just the beginning. It takes a whole lot more to create a launch service.

Our team has really risen to the occasion in recent months, doing the necessary work and driving forward at a best-in-industry pace — despite the unprecedented circumstances of a global pandemic that has changed everything about the way we all live and work.

Recent Milestones

The rocket we will use for Launch Demo 2 shipped out of the factory in late August. After making the short trip up to Mojave Air and Spaceport, that rocket was fitted to a test stand built to emulate Cosmic Girl's left wing. There, our team hooked up our mobile ground support trailers and conducted a number of checkouts and tests, including fully loading the rocket with propellants like cryogenic liquid oxygen to verify the health of all rocket systems. The test was a major success, and the operation, which resembled a full countdown, benefited hugely from our operational refinements: completing cryo load was a much faster and much smoother process compared to the first time around earlier this year.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196314.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196315.jpg)

We saw a similar quantum leap with the other build and test series we recently completed: the acceptance testing (ATP) campaign for our main stage ("NewtonThree") engine. Main stage propulsion is a big task for any rocket and any launch, and given the knowledge that we gained from our first Launch Demo (https://virginorbit.com/wrapping-up-our-first-launch-demo-and-looking-ahead-to-launch-demo-2/), this milestone took on even more importance. But we got through it extremely quickly: work that took us two months to complete just one launch ago was finished in just two weeks this past September.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196320.jpg)

Our team is better prepared, our hardware is better manufactured, all of our procedures, scripts, and tools are in launch-ready shape — and all of that hard work is paying off big time.

You can hear directly from our technical leaders on what we've been up to since our last flight:
youtu.be/r7figg6NPg0
 

What's Next?

Today, both rocket and engine are back down in our Long Beach HQ for final integration. Our NewtonFour upper stage engine is already fully tested and installed, and our NewtonThree engine and a few other bits of flight hardware will join the party in the coming days. We're preparing for the big move — packing up the rocket and the mobile trailers and transiting everything back to the "hammerhead" at Mojave Air and Space Port — a bare spot at the end of a taxiway (which is all we really require in a launch site). That's where we'll mate LauncherOne to Cosmic Girl's wing just before we fly.

Here's a glimpse of all of the major campaigns we planned out in between our first Launch Demo in late May and our upcoming flight.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196317.png)

As you'll see, we are moving steadily forward. We're not done yet, but every day brings more progress, and we're keeping our nose to the grindstone so that we can maintain this momentum.

This week, we're taking another exciting step forward. Yesterday, for the first time in our company's short history, customers arrived at our facility to begin processing their spacecraft for launch!

Thanks to COVID-19 everything looks a little different than we'd imagined, to be sure. But we've worked with NASA and with our payload teams to find safe ways for teams to conduct this work in our beautiful new payload processing facility, called Nebula.

While they're on-site this week, we'll work with each team to complete a final round of analysis and testing before finally integrating their payloads into the fairing. The fairing will then be shipped up to Mojave, where we'll do the final mate to the rocket in our unique mobile cleanroom.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196318.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196319.jpg)

Though our focus has been squarely on preparing for Launch Demo 2 and on welcoming our customers and their spacecraft, our other projects continue to make steady progress. Recently, we participated as the sole space launch provider in one of the biggest military training exercises of all time (https://virginorbit.com/vox-space-simulates-responsive-launch-for-us-air-force-abms-exercise/), demonstrating how a country could very quickly replace a satellite that had been interfered with by an adversary. We have also updated our Service Guide (https://virginorbit.com/our-2020-service-guide-a-smoother-path-to-orbit/) to better set up our customers for success as they plan their missions with LauncherOne. And in parallel to all of that, we're also preparing the hardware we'll use on the four flights that follow LD2.

None of this work is ever easy — even in a normal world, much less in the odd world we're all living in 2020. But the work is worth doing, and it can be done well with the right team, the right tools, and the right experience. We're excited about what we've done, and fired up about what comes next. The team working hard to pull off our second Launch Demo prior to the holidays, and we'll keep you all updated every step of the way.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit планируют вторую попытку запуска своей ракеты LauncherOne
Окно для запуска миссии Launch Demo 2 открывается 10 января. Резервные дни: 17, 24 и 31 января
Компания уже доставила ракету LauncherOne для новой миссии со своего завода в Калифорнии на аэродром в Мохаве. Она была подвешена под крыло специального самолёта-носителя Boeing 747 "Cosmic Girl". В связи с пандемией компания отказалась от попытки запуска в конце декабря того года, но сейчас Virgin Orbit снова вернулись к работе и нацелены всё-таки запустить свою ракету.

Спойлер

Первая попытка запуска LauncherOne 25 мая этого года была неуспешна, двигатель первой ступени отключился спустя пару секунд после зажигания.
Было проведено расследование, которое показало, что вышла из строя линия подачи кислорода, что привело к преждевременному отключению двигателя.
В первой миссии LauncherOne не несла полезной нагрузки. В новой миссии ракета будет нести 10 кубсатов от NASA в рамках контракта Venture Class Launch Service, заключённого в 2015 для демонстрации технологий и запуска малых космических аппаратов в космос.

[свернуть]

Это будет 20-я миссия NASA по программе ELaNa, она поможет провести на орбите 9 разнообразных миссий, используя небольшие спутники для демонстрации новых технологий и проведения научных и образовательных исследований.
Почти каждая полезная нагрузка этой миссии была полностью разработана и произведена силами университетов:

🛰 CACTUS-1 - 3U кубсат, для демонстрации двух технологий. Одна из них должна решить проблему космического "мусора" с помощью аэрогеля для его захвата и последующего свода. Вторая - модуль Hermes, который демонстрирует технологию управления с помощью сети Интернет, как экономичную коммуникационную и командную систему для сбора научных данных.
🛰 CAPE-3 - кубсат для образовательной миссии Smartphone CubeSat Classroom, которая позволяет любому, у кого есть смартфон участвовать в интерактивном образовательном мероприятии и взаимодействовать с кубсатом через приложение на его телефоне.
🛰 EXOCUBE-2 - 3U кубсат для исследования космической погоды, который будет измерять количество частиц в экзосфере. Знание состава и текущего состояния активности в экзосфере может быть полезно при прогнозировании потенциальных воздействий на спутниковую связь и негативного влияния на космические аппараты.
🛰 MiTEE - два образовательных пикоспутника в одном космическом аппарате, для демонстрации спутниковой системы связи. Они позволят студентам поработать над реальной исследовательской миссией с двумя кубсатами, связанными между собой системой тросов для оценки их электродинамических характеристик.
🛰 PICS - два демонстрационных кубсата, которые проведут осмотр друг друга и системы развёртывания с помощью камер. В перспективе это должно помочь создать кубсаты для наблюдений и выполнения технических работ друг с другом прямо на орбите.
🛰 PolarCube - кубсат, который собирает данные о температуре поверхности Земли и атмосферы. Его цель - сбор температурных показателей для формирования карт температур, что полезно для наблюдений за штормами и изучения морского льда вблизи полюсов Земли.
🛰 Q-PACE - кубсат для изучения столкновений космических объектов, подобных тому, что происходили во время раннего протопланетного диска. Спутник будет наблюдать столкновения между частицами сантиметрового размера и даже более мелкими, помогая решить загадку: как тела в космосе вырастают за барьер метрового размера и потом могут становиться планетами в результате гравитационной аккреции.
🛰 RadFXSat-2 - кубсат для изучения влияния космического излучения на оперативную память (SRAM) с целью проверки прогнозов частоты появления ошибок в единичных событиях. Также он протестирует двустороннюю любительскую радиосвязь.
🛰 TechEdSat-7 - кубсат для демонстрации новых технологий для будущих экспериментов на борту малых спутников. После 60 дней нахождения на орбите спутнику будет дана команда быстро сойти с орбиты с помощью своеобразного космического "парашюта" под названием Exo-Brake.

Но все эти кубсаты доберутся до орбиты, если ракета LauncherOne сработает как надо, поэтому мы желаем Virgin Orbit - успешной миссии и обязательно расскажем, смогла ли компания выйти на орбиту

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit совершила первый успешный пуск на орбиту ракеты-носителя системы воздушного старта
17.01.2021 23:56:31
       Вашингтон. 17 января. ИНТЕРФАКС - Калифорнийская компания Virgin Orbit в воскресенье в ходе демонстрационного испытания успешно запустила на орбиту с борта самолета ракету-носитель LauncherOne, сообщается на ее сайте.
      "Ракета LauncherOne вышла на орбиту", - говорится в сообщении.
       Ракета-носитель LauncherOne, которую разрабатывает американская компания, предназначена для вывода на орбиту небольших спутников.
       В ходе демонстрационного испытания двухступенчатая ракета длиной 21 метр была сброшена на высоте примерно 10,2 тысяч метров с модифицированного самолета Boeing 747 (под названием Cosmic Girl) над Тихим океаном, после чего на ней включился двигатель. Вслед за отделением первой ступени ракета отправилась на штатную орбиту с десятью исследовательскими миниспутниками американских университетов и NASA.
       Самолет с ракетой вылетел с аэродрома Мохаве в Калифорнии и осуществил пуск ракеты примерно в 22:38 мск в 150 км к юго-западу от города Лонг-Бич над океаном.
       Разрабатываемая орбитальная ракета, которая крепится под левым крылом самолета, после воздушного старта должна выводить на солнечно-синхронную орбиту до 500 кг полезной нагрузки.
       Это первое успешное демонстрационное испытание ракеты LauncherOne компанией Virgin Orbit, принадлежащей британскому миллиардеру Ричарду Брэнсону. Основное предприятие компании находится в городе Лонг-Бич. Разработки системы воздушного старта начались в 2015 году.
       В компании отмечают, что такой вывод в космос небольших спутников будет значительно дешевле обычных ракетных пусков. Ракета LauncherOne использует ракетный керосин и жидкий кислород в качестве топлива, что делает стоимость достаточно невысокой.
       Система воздушного старта также позволяет быстро перемещать ракету в любой район для запуска. Virgin Orbit ранее сообщала, что в перспективе запуски планируется осуществлять с аэродромов в США, Японии и Великобритании.
       В мае прошлого года первый демонстрационный запуск LauncherOne окончился неудачей. После отделения от самолета ракета из-за отказа двигателей первой ступени упала в океан.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit Aces Second Launch Demo and Deploys NASA Payloads
January 17, 2021 Featured/Press Releases
Mojave, California — January 17, 2021 — Virgin Orbit, the California-based satellite launch company, confirmed that its LauncherOne rocket reached space during the company's second launch demonstration today, successfully deploying 10 payloads for NASA's Launch Services Program (LSP).
Virgin Orbit's novel launch system uses a technique called air launch, in which a rocket is launched from under the wing of a jet aircraft, rather than from a traditional launch pad on the ground. In addition to improving the payload capacity of the rocket, this technique allows the LauncherOne system to be the world's most flexible and responsive launch service — flying on short notice and from a wide variety of locations to access any orbit.
For today's picture-perfect mission, Virgin Orbit's carrier aircraft, a customized 747-400 dubbed Cosmic Girl, took off from Mojave Air and Space Port at approximately 10:50 A.M. and flew out to a launch site over the Pacific Ocean, about 50 miles south of the Channel Islands. After a smooth release from the aircraft, the two-stage rocket ignited and powered itself to orbit. At the conclusion of the flight, the LauncherOne rocket deployed 10 CubeSats into the team's precise target orbit, marking a major step forward for Virgin Orbit in its quest to bust down the barriers preventing affordable and responsive access to space.
The payloads onboard LauncherOne today were selected by NASA LSP as part of the agency's CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI). Nearly all of the CubeSat missions were designed, built and tested by universities across the U.S., including Brigham Young University (PICS), the University of Michigan (MiTEE), and the University of Louisiana at Lafayette (CAPE-3).
This flight also marks a historical first: no other orbital class, air-launched, liquid-fueled rocket had successfully reached space before today. 
"A new gateway to space has just sprung open! That LauncherOne was able to successfully reach orbit today is a testament to this team's talent, precision, drive, and ingenuity. Even in the face of a global pandemic, we've maintained a laser focus on fully demonstrating every element of this revolutionary launch system. That effort paid off today with a beautifully executed mission, and we couldn't be happier," said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart.
"Virgin Orbit has achieved something many thought impossible. It was so inspiring to see our specially adapted Virgin Atlantic 747, Cosmic Girl, send the LauncherOne rocket soaring into orbit. This magnificent flight is the culmination of many years of hard work and will also unleash a whole new generation of innovators on the path to orbit. I can't wait to see the incredible missions Dan and the team will launch to change the world for good," said Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson.
With this successful demonstration in the books, Virgin Orbit will officially transition into commercial service for its next mission. Virgin Orbit has subsequent launches booked by customers ranging from the U.S. Space Force and the U.K.'s Royal Air Force to commercial customers like Swarm Technologies, Italy's SITAEL, and Denmark's GomSpace.
The company's next few rockets are already well into integration at its Long Beach manufacturing facility.
31.jpg

Цитата: cross-track от 27.05.2020 21:04:54

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 27.05.2020 19:55:20"Гасление двигателя" (перевод Гугля), значит... Ну-ну...

Вашу подпись Гугл тоже забавно переводит)

Lingua latina non penis canina
Латинский язык без пениса

Цитата: Старый от 10.07.2020 20:24:48

Цитата: cross-track от 27.05.2020 21:04:54Вашу подпись Гугл тоже забавно переводит)

Lingua latina non penis canina
Латинский язык без пениса

Толи в латинском нет притяжательного падежа, толи Саныч его не смог употребить, но канина оказалась не при делах.

Цитировать23.jpg
RNLAF Mission to Explore Advantages of Responsive Launch in Deploying First Small Satellite on LauncherOne
Long Beach, California — January 25, 2021 — Virgin Orbit, the California-based satellite launch company, announced today that it has been selected by the Dutch space engineering company Innovative Solutions in Space (ISIS) to launch the Royal Netherlands Air Force's (RNLAF) first ever satellite, a 6U CubeSat called BRIK-II. Designed and integrated by ISIS, BRIK-II will serve as a testbed for various communications experiments and demonstrate how nanosatellites can provide a meaningful contribution to military operations. The mission represents a significant step forward for the Dutch Ministry of Defense's efforts to develop their first space capabilities, with a particular emphasis on responsive launch.

Currently scheduled to launch in 2021, BRIK-II will fly as a rideshare payload on an upcoming LauncherOne mission. Virgin Orbit is also working via their subsidiary, VOX Space, to add payloads to this mission from the U.S. Department of Defense's (DOD) Space Test Program. With the U.S. government as a co-passenger, the mission represents an exciting opportunity for the Netherlands and the U.S. to jointly explore, develop and benefit from the next generation of space capabilities.

As part of the Netherlands' broader plan to pursue a responsive space capability, RNLAF, Virgin Orbit and ISIS will pursue a demonstration of "late-load" integration, mating the payload to the rocket shortly prior to launch. This exercise will prove critical in pioneering the payload processing capabilities required to execute responsive launch. Following this exercise, Virgin Orbit and RNLAF will analyze the results and document them in a future whitepaper to be shared with other allied partners.

Virgin Orbit will conduct this mission from Mojave Air and Space Port in California.

"Being able to launch our very first satellite is a major milestone for the RNLAF and the Dutch joint force as a whole. We are on a pathway to developing space capabilities as part of a yet to be released MoD Space Strategy. As set out in our latest Defense White Paper, we would like to develop our Joint ISR capabilities in space alongside our allies and partners," said RNLAF commander Lt. Gen Dennis Luyt. "Being able to share this major milestone with Virgin Orbit's development of responsive launch capability is second to none. We feel privileged to take this step and look forward to what the future has to offer."

"We're so honored to be supporting the RNLAF by providing this first launch, and we're looking forward to seeing the Netherlands and the U.S. find mutual benefit from leveraging our uniquely flexible and mobile launch system. I can already foresee the day when we will take off from a runway on Dutch soil and deliver RNLAF satellites to space directly. LauncherOne's unique air launch capability is filling a gap for government space missions — mobility and responsiveness are sorely needed to disincentivize aggression in space at a time when we rely more and more on a threatened space infrastructure," said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart.

ЦитироватьБританский космопорт Корнуолл весной следующего года начинает первые запуски
Вслед за первым успешным орбитальным запуском, компания Virgin Orbit планирует расширить возможности для своего бизнеса и начать полёты из Великобритании.
Мелисса Торп (Melissa Thorpe), глава космопорта, находящегося недалеко от Ньюки, на юго-западе Англии, сказала, что сейчас её внимание сосредоточено на первом запуске Virgin Orbit с местного аэродрома. Космопорт Корнуолл будет стартовой площадкой для "воздушных стартов", где модифицированные самолёты будут использоваться для сброса ракет с последующим запуском на орбиту малых спутников и кубсатов.
Первый запуск с космодрома изначально был запланирован на октябрь этого года, но задержки с получением разрешений и пандемия отодвинули дату вправо. Космопорт надеется подать заявку на получение лицензий, необходимых для работы в качестве космодрома до конца этого года.
Virgin Orbit также должна получить лицензию, необходимую для запуска с этой площадки.
Торп подчеркнула, что на космодроме будут представлены не только Virgin Orbit. Ведётся работа по привлечению и других операторов, её результаты будут объявлены в конце года.
"Для меня запуски, без сомнения, самая захватывающая часть действа, но это также своеобразный космодром-катализатор, как платформа для привлечения бизнеса, инвестиций, рабочих мест и финансирования в этот район. У нас есть невероятные компании, создающие потрясающие вещи, и они работают над проектами мирового уровня. Мы хотим, чтобы они были представлены и у нас. Мы выходим из пандемии и создаём новые рабочие места, двигаясь вперёд!", - заявила она.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit проведет первый коммерческий запуск в космос с помощью ракеты с борта самолета
Космическая компания Virgin Orbit объявила, что ее первый коммерческий запуск с помощью системы LauncherOne состоится для польской компании SatRevolution. LauncherOne может запускать на околоземную орбиту спутники весом до 500 кг с борта лайнера Boeing 747–400. Ранее в январе 2021 года компания со второй попытки провела первый успешный запуск новой системы.
В конце года в космос будут запущены спутники компании SatRevolution под названиями STORK-4 и STORK-5 (MARTA). Они предназначаются для оптического и мультиспектрального зондирования Земли для сельскохозяйственных нужд. В будущем в компании рассчитывают запустить до 14 спутников для потребителей из США, Польши и других стран. В 2019 году Virgin Orbit и SatRevolution уже договорились о совместной разработке и отправке на Марс первых в мире коммерческих спутников в 2022 году.
Евгений Федуненко

ЦитироватьFEBRUARY 9, 2021
The LauncherOne mission will be the first to deploy payloads for SatRevolution's STORK Earth observation constellation
Long Beach, California — February 9, 2021 — Virgin Orbit, the California-based satellite launch company, announced today it has signed a new launch agreement with SatRevolution, a NewSpace satellite company headquartered in Wroclaw, Poland. For this contract, Virgin Orbit will launch a pair of small satellites, STORK-4 and STORK-5 (MARTA), later this year onboard its LauncherOne rocket.

Based on the state-of-the-art UniBus 3U CubeSat platform developed by SatRevolution, STORK-4 and MARTA are the first optical satellites to be launched as part of the company's 14-satellite STORK constellation. Once deployed, STORK-4 and MARTA will collect multispectral medium-resolution imagery and data for agricultural and energy customers in the US, in Poland, and abroad. The mission will also feature a reduced timeline integration of the STORK-4 and MARTA satellites as part of a critical first step in demonstrating a responsive launch service. Future LauncherOne missions will be designed to offer a rapid launch capability, with the companies working closely to ensure that quick call-up capabilities are readily available.

The launch agreement builds on an existing relationship between Virgin Orbit and SatRevolution. In 2019, alongside nearly a dozen of the top technical Polish universities, the two companies became founding members of a consortium to develop the world's first dedicated commercial small satellite missions to Mars. The Polish Mission to Mars Consortium seeks to launch best-in-class satellite technology by taking advantage of LauncherOne's Virgin Interplanetary (or VIP) Service, which offers unique flexibility to access greater and more optimal launch windows for journeys to Mars and other interplanetary destinations.

"The signed agreement is another international cooperation which uses the experience and potential of Polish companies and their specialists involved in space activities. It is also worth emphasizing that thanks to such initiatives we highlight our expert positions in the global arena of space exploration," said Michał Jach, Chairman of Polish Parliament's National Defense Committee.

"Responsive launch services from Virgin Orbit bring great benefits for constellation developers like SatRevolution. We're happy to be a part of LauncherOne's first commercial mission and are looking forward to expanding our partnership and friendship through future missions," said SatRevolution CEO Grzegorz Zwolinski.

"We're honored to have been selected to launch these two cutting-edge spacecraft for our friends at SatRevolution as they drive forward the global small satellite revolution with breakthrough capabilities. Innovative satellite networks like STORK unlock tremendous value in the space supply chain," said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart. "LauncherOne is ready to deliver these constellations into orbit, and we're very excited to have a role in moving forward Polish-American collaboration in space."

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit выиграла контракт на запуск спутников HyperSat
Компания HyperSat решила доверить выведение шести спутников гиперспектрального наблюдения за Землей ракете LauncherOne. Датой этого пуска заявлен период не ранее 2023 года, сообщает Ecoruspace.
К причинам, по которым компания решила доверить выведение компании Брэнсона заявлено то, что она обеспечит не только быстрый запуск по требованию, но и достаточно точное выведение на целевую орбиту. Таким образом у заказчика появится дополнительное спокойствие, которое необходимо при создании аппаратов. Разработчиком спутников является QinetiQ.
А.Ж.

ЦитироватьIntroducing Our Next Mission: Tubular Bells, Part One
Since our flawless Launch Demo 2 mission (https://virginorbit.com/the-latest/virgin-orbit-aces-second-launch-demo-and-deploys-nasa-payloads/) in January, the Virgin Orbit team hasn't wasted any time in working towards yet another flight with LauncherOne. At this very moment, the rocket that will carry our next customers to space is fully assembled, and in the coming days we'll ship it out to our Mojave test site for prelaunch operations. As all this is now familiar work, our team has been able to operate at a whole new level of efficiency and precision.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196321.jpg)
Historically, the space industry has been slow to ramp up from early tests to the start of commercial service. Thanks to a world-class team and our fully operational, cutting-edge factory, Virgin Orbit is breaking that tradition. Currently, our efforts are on track for our next orbital launch in June.
We're proud to have retired our "Launch Demo" program and the corresponding mission names, and are delighted to share with you some details about our upcoming mission, which we have named "Tubular Bells, Part One."
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196323.jpg)

Mission Manifest

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/196322.png)

» The U.S. Department of Defense, which is launching three CubeSat sets as part of the DoD Space Test Program's (STP) Rapid Agile Launch (RALI) Initiative. This launch, also known as STP-27VPA, was awarded to Virgin Orbit subsidiary VOX Space by the DoD's Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), an organization working to accelerate the adoption of commercial technology into the U.S. military to strengthen national security. 

» The Royal Netherlands Air Force, which is launching the Netherlands' first military satellite, a CubeSat called BRIK II, built and integrated by Innovative Solutions in Space, with contributions from the University of Oslo, the Delft University of Technology, and Royal Netherlands Aerospace Centre.

» SatRevolution, which is launching the first two optical satellites, STORK-4 and STORK-5 (A.K.A. MARTA), of the company's 14-satellite STORK constellation.

Launch Site

As with our previous mission, we will conduct the mission from what is currently a bare concrete pad at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California.

Target Orbit

500 km, circular orbit at 60 degrees inclination

Launch Timing

June 2021

Launch Coverage

A public livestream of the mission will be available on our website. You can also get real-time updates via social media: just follow us on Twitter @VirginOrbit (https://twitter.com/VirginOrbit).
Mission Name: "Tubular Bells, Part One"

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit  @VirginOrbit
We're calling this mission "Tubular Bells, Part One," in homage to the first track and first album ever released by Virgin Records.
https://virg.in/ZLUA
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/174984.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/174985.jpg)

ЦитироватьMichael Sheetz  @thesheetztweetz
Virgin Orbit technology development:
In progress
-Orbital transfer vehicle
-Increase LauncherOne performance to 500-600 kg capable

Long-term
-Reusable LauncherOne
-LauncherTwo (which would launch on top the aircraft, instead of under the wing)
https://cnbc.com/2021/08/23/richard-bransons-virgin-orbit-spac-public-at-3point7-billion-valuation.html(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/175436.jpg)

Цитата: azvoz от 24.08.2021 21:05:42Кто точно знает с какой высоты ракету отцепляют?
В одних источниках указывают 10 км , в других 13 км.

Цитата: azvoz от 24.08.2021 21:05:42Планируют ли увеличение высоты в будущих запусках?

Цитата: vissarion от 25.08.2021 08:22:56Также по правилам уже на FL 410 пилот уже должен сидеть в кислородной маске - это неудобно

Цитата: ratcustorb от 25.08.2021 08:42:26По правилам для таких запусков? Или для В-747 вообще?

ЦитироватьВ ноябре этого года компания Virgin Orbit планирует осуществить 
первый запуск ракеты LauncherOne с территории Великобритании:

Цитировать(https://telegra.ph/Virgin-Orbit-gotovyatsya-zapustit-pervuyu-zarubezhnuyu-missiyu-10-16)
Virgin Orbit готовятся запустить первую зарубежную миссию
Компания планирует запустить миссию Start Me Up со своего самолёта-стартовой площадки Cosmic Girl, 
который взлетит с аэродрома Корнуолл в Великобритании.

ЦитироватьИтоги 2022 года компании Virgin Orbit (РН воздушного старта LauncherOne)

— 2 успешных запуска
— 15 спутников запущены на орбиту
— Получено разрешение на первый запуск из Великобритании ✅ (он ожидается в январе 2023 года).

В целом, этот год компании Ричарда Брэнсона можно с одной стороны назвать успешным - все осуществлённые запуски были успешны, с другой, их количество оказалось существенно меньше запланированного. Задержался и был перенесён на следующий год первый иностранный запуск компании.

Однако в отличие от Virgin Galactic, которая находится в крайне сложном положении, у Virgin Orbit пока есть шансы остаться на рынке. Посмотрим, как покажет себя компания в следующем году, имея контракты на запуски из Великобритании и Бразилии, и увеличивая флот своих самолётов-стартовых площадок. Ещё один такой самолёт будет готов поддержать миссии Virgin Orbit уже в новом году.

ЦитироватьРакета LauncherOne компании Virgin Orbit не вышла на орбиту 🚫

Virgin Orbit:
— Мы столкнулись с аномалией, которая помешала ракете выйти на орбиту. Мы анализируем информацию.

Цитата: azvoz от 10.01.2023 07:37:05Мы столкнулись с аномалией, которая помешала ракете выйти на орбиту

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 16.03.2023 19:32:38Похоже, обрушение рынка нано- и микролончеров началось: закрыт проект РН СЛК Launcher, у Launcher One и Астры - проблемы. Рокет Лаб ещё держится, потому что был первым и успел набрать заказов + умный Питер Бек вовремя смекнул, что из этого сегмента надо бежать и занялся Нейтроном. Остальные, более-менее реальные стартапы в лице АБЛ, ФайрФлай, Релятивити Спейс и так изначально работали с РН ЛК и тоже хотят уйти в сегмент средних РН.

Цитата: Павел73 от 16.03.2023 11:03:49

Код Выделить Развернуть

https://t.me/roscosmos_press/976

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit приостановила работу для корректировки инвестиционного плана
Американская компания Virgin Orbit приостановила в четверг работу, отправив сотрудников в неоплачиваемый отпуск. Об этом в четверг сообщила британская вещательная корпорация Би-би-си.
"Virgin Orbit временно прекращает деятельность с 16 марта 2023 года", - говорится в заявлении компании. Она пообещала предоставить обновленную информацию на этот счет "в ближайшие недели". По словам генерального директора компании Дэна Харта, это позволит компании доработать новый инвестиционный план, передаёт ТАСС.
А.Ж.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 16.03.2023 19:32:38Похоже, обрушение рынка нано- и микролончеров началось: закрыт проект РН СЛК Launcher, у Launcher One и Астры - проблемы. Рокет Лаб ещё держится, потому что был первым и успел набрать заказов + умный Питер Бек вовремя смекнул, что из этого сегмента надо бежать и занялся Нейтроном. Остальные, более-менее реальные стартапы в лице АБЛ, ФайрФлай, Релятивити Спейс и так изначально работали с РН ЛК и тоже хотят уйти в сегмент средних РН.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 16.03.2023 19:32:38Похоже, обрушение рынка нано- и микролончеров началось: закрыт проект РН СЛК Launcher, у Launcher One и Астры - проблемы. Рокет Лаб ещё держится, потому что был первым и успел набрать заказов + умный Питер Бек вовремя смекнул, что из этого сегмента надо бежать и занялся Нейтроном. Остальные, более-менее реальные стартапы в лице АБЛ, ФайрФлай, Релятивити Спейс и так изначально работали с РН ЛК и тоже хотят уйти в сегмент средних РН.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit - будет спасена!
Согласно нескольким источникам в отрасли, компания Virgin Orbit находится на стадии финальных переговоров о привлечении $200 млн от Matthew Brown Companies.

Структура описывает себя как венчурных инвесторов из Техаса, инвестирующих в т.ч. в космические компании. По данным Crunchbase, которая отслеживает стартапы и инвестиции в них, эта структура участвовала в раундах по привлечению финансирования компаний SpaceX, Rocket Lab и Astra. Глава компании - Мэтью Браун, он же председатель одноимённой семейной группы Matthew Brown Cos., образованной в 2008 году в Далласе, под контролем которой находится корпорация Energent Energy, специализирующаяся на возобновляемых источниках энергии и инвестициях в климатические проекты. Браун уже много лет присматривается к космическому сектору, особенно к операторам запуска.

Выясняется, что Virgin Orbit и Matthew Brown Companies начали переговоры о сделке на прошлой неделе, примерно в то же время компания объявила о приостановке работы. По словам источников, стороны намерены закрыть сделку 24 марта за счёт частного размещения акций. Matthew Brown Companies получит контрольный пакет акций компании. В то же время, Virgin Orbit продолжила переговоры с другим, пока неназванным потенциальным инвестором.

Одновременно с этим, исполнительный директор Дэн Харт сообщил, что небольшая группа сотрудников вернётся к работе над подготовкой к следующему запуску компании уже в четверг. Харт назвал это первым шагом к возобновлению работы компании, однако основная часть сотрудников пока будет находиться в отпуске. Ожидается, что операционная пауза продлится до 27 марта.
Акции Virgin Orbit выросли сразу на 50% во время открытия торгов на бирже в среду.

Цитировать"Unfortunately, we've not been able to secure the funding to provide a clear path for this company," Hart said

ЦитироватьThe company will eliminate all but 100 positions, amounting to about 90% of the workforce, Hart said, noting the layoffs will affect every team and department. In a securities filing (https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/0001843388/000184338823000063/vorb-20230330.htm), the company said the layoffs constituted 675 positions, or approximately 85%.
"This company, this team — all of you — mean a hell of a lot to me. And I have not, and will not, stop supporting you, whether you're here on the journey or if you're elsewhere," Hart said.

ЦитироватьEric Berger @SciGuySpace


Virgin Orbit's demise will come as no surprise to anyone paying attention. Small launch is a brutal business. They had no ability to scale to a larger rocket. This still SUCKS for some great people who worked very hard to solve myriad technical challenges and fly LauncherOne.



Seriously, air-launching a liquid fueled rocket is really damn hard. I was really impressed by their technical execution. But spending $1 billion to develop a rocket capable of launching a few hundred kilograms to space is financial insanity.

ЦитироватьVirgin Orbit прекратит деятельность из-за проблем с финансированием
ТАСС, 31 марта. Компания Virgin Orbit, основанная британским миллиардером Ричардом Брэнсоном и занимающаяся запуском спутников, прекратит свою деятельность "в обозримом будущем" из-за недостатка финансирования. Об этом сообщил телеканал CNBC со ссылкой на аудиозапись выступления генерального директора Дэна Харта в четверг на совещании компании.

"К сожалению, мы не смогли заручиться финансированием, чтобы обеспечить четкий путь для этой компании", - заявил Харт. По его словам, решено уволить около 90% персонала всех подразделений компании, кроме 100 сотрудников. Virgin Orbit "предоставит выходное пособие каждому увольняемому работнику", включая денежную выплату и помощь в поиске новой работы, заверил Харт.

Как передает телеканал, переговоры с двумя инвесторами провалились в минувшие выходные. Харт сообщил сотрудникам в минувший понедельник, что диалог с другими потенциальными инвесторами продолжается "очень динамично".

16 марта британская вещательная корпорация Би-би-си сообщила о том, что Virgin Orbit "временно прекращает деятельность".

Спойлер

Первый в истории запуск Virgin Orbit космических спутников с территории Великобритании завершился неудачей в январе из-за отключения двигателя второй ступени ракеты-носителя LauncherOne. Двигатель первой ступени включился спустя четыре секунды после сброса и работал положенные три минуты перед тем, как первая ступень отделилась. Впоследствии должна была отсоединиться и вторая ступень ракеты, которая поднимает полезную нагрузку на околоземную орбиту (примерно 550 км), однако этого не произошло. Virgin Orbit пообещала предпринять еще одну попытку запуска спутников с территории Великобритании к концу этого года.

[свернуть]

Цитата: DYF от 31.03.2023 01:46:12

ЦитироватьEric Berger @SciGuySpace


Virgin Orbit's demise will come as no surprise to anyone paying attention. Small launch is a brutal business. They had no ability to scale to a larger rocket. This still SUCKS for some great people who worked very hard to solve myriad technical challenges and fly LauncherOne.

Seriously, air-launching a liquid fueled rocket is really damn hard. I was really impressed by their technical execution. But spending $1 billion to develop a rocket capable of launching a few hundred kilograms to space is financial insanity.

Цитата: azvoz от 31.03.2023 07:56:18А на первую ступень гораздо более мощный ЖРД.

Цитата: Boris  Mekler от 31.03.2023 10:22:13

Цитата: azvoz от 31.03.2023 07:56:18А на первую ступень гораздо более мощный ЖРД.

...и выкинуть нафиг воздушный запуск.

Цитата: azvoz от 31.03.2023 10:35:05упрощение СК

Цитата: Boris  Mekler от 31.03.2023 13:54:29

Цитата: azvoz от 31.03.2023 10:35:05упрощение СК

Наоборот. Стартовый комплекс - это сам самолёт-носитель, и к требованиям к нему добавляются вес, габариты, и безопасность для кожаных мешков которые, в отличие от наземного старта, обязаны сидеть верхом на заправленной ракете без какой-либо возможности свалить подальше. Кроме этого теряется возможность отмены пуска после запуска двигателей - если на наземном старте если движок забарахлит при старте автоматика его остановит и можно слить топливо и поискать неисправность, то после сброса с самолёта дорога только на орбиту или в океан.

Цитата: Водитель от 31.03.2023 13:33:28Все вместе. И рынка для выводка этих мелкашек нет, и воздушный старт для этого далеко не лучший выбор.

Это один из таких проектов, что был обречен изначально, имхо.

Цитата: Водитель от 31.03.2023 13:33:28Все вместе. И рынка для выводка этих мелкашек нет, и воздушный старт для этого далеко не лучший выбор.
Это один из таких проектов, что был обречен изначально, имхо.

Цитата: Старый от 03.10.2010 01:19:48

ЦитироватьТам по-английски написано, что с туризмом все хорошо...

Ой, тут у нас на заборах по русски такое пишут...
 Вобщем бумага всё стерпит, а вот с туризмом чтото ничего хорошего не видно. Похоже ЫЫ-2 становится Ангарой-2 вечноготовой через 2 года.

Цитата: avmich от 31.07.2012 11:15:59

Цитировать

ЦитироватьТо есть, арабские инвесторы, вложившие несколько сот миллионов, сочтут, что лучше списать эти деньги, чем вложить ещё?

а зачем "вложить еще"? Чтобы еще больше сжечь в этой топке?

Обычное дело, называется "раунд инвестиций". Компании есть что показать за те деньги, что она уже получила - что подтверждает осмысленность проекта. Теперь можно предложить следующий этап, следующий план расходов и доходов, соответственно и следующие инвестиции.

О какой топке речь, непонятно. VG не топка, а нормальная современная аэрокосмическая компания.

Цитата: Старый от 31.07.2012 09:51:14

ЦитироватьМне не очень понятно - мне кажется, мы на этом форуме достаточно хорошо понимаем техническую возможность таких полётов. Мало того, есть прототип. Проблемы в деталях, а не в принципе.

Отнюдь. Прооблема принципиальна. Проблема в том что это не технический а коммерческий проект. И будет ли он приносить прибыль - вот главная проблема. Если он будет убыточен то он обанкротится независимо от наличия/отсутствия технических проблем.

Цитата: Туман Андромедов от 16.03.2023 19:16:40Опять Кёрк, наш, Пайшер без работы остался...

Цитата: Водитель от 31.03.2023 18:33:50Ну об этом и речь. Спрос с избытком пока покрывают существующие РН. И это даже без запрещённых китайских и российских РН.

Цитата: Major Meff от 08.04.2023 17:46:04Кто из наших разлетевшихся контор и уволенных манагеров такое может себе позволить?

Цитата: azvoz от 08.04.2023 17:49:45

Цитата: Major Meff от 08.04.2023 17:46:04Кто из наших разлетевшихся контор и уволенных манагеров такое может себе позволить?

Из "ваших" это из каких?
А то по нику совсем не понятно.

Цитата: Major Meff от 09.04.2023 14:39:55

Цитата: azvoz от 08.04.2023 17:49:45

Цитата: Major Meff от 08.04.2023 17:46:04Кто из наших разлетевшихся контор и уволенных манагеров такое может себе позволить?

Из "ваших" это из каких?
А то по нику совсем не понятно.

Например, из Даурии, Ялины, КосмоКурса, С7 Космических транспортных систем, Международных космических услуг, Космотраса и его наследника Главкосмоса Пусковых услуг. И просто из Пусковых Услуг (которые на Тополе из Свободного пуляли).

Цитата: Pirat5 от 05.06.2023 19:46:59При этом несколько ракет LauncherOne и интеллектуальная собственность компании пока проданы не были.
https://spacenews.com/three-companies-to-buy-most-virgin-orbit-assets/ (https://spacenews.com/three-companies-to-buy-most-virgin-orbit-assets/)
t.me/newspace_times/1827

Цитата: nonconvex от 06.06.2023 05:30:58Будет интересно посмотреть, заинтересуется ли кто либо интеллектуальной собственостью Илона нашего Маска.

Цитата: Старый от 05.06.2023 21:20:46Итак кончилась крахом очередная попытка "в космос на крыльях". 

Цитата: Туман Андромедов от 06.06.2023 19:14:35Жаль. Красивая машина. Ну и повторный запуск криогенного блока на 5 секунд, с использованием 35-40 кг топлива, при совсем небольшом общем количестве топлива в баке перед включением впечатляет.
Что-то не принимает земля Лонг Бича красивых космических проектов....

Цитата: Туман Андромедов от 06.06.2023 19:14:35Жаль. Красивая машина. Ну и повторный запуск криогенного блока на 5 секунд, с использованием 35-40 кг топлива, при совсем небольшом общем количестве топлива в баке перед включением впечатляет.
Что-то не принимает земля Лонг Бича красивых космических проектов....

Цитата: Туман Андромедов от 06.06.2023 19:14:35Жаль. Красивая машина.

Цитата: Евгений Б. от 06.06.2023 08:39:43

Цитата: nonconvex от 06.06.2023 05:30:58Будет интересно посмотреть, заинтересуется ли кто либо интеллектуальной собственостью Илона нашего Маска.

Мерлин кто угодно купит за объявленную Маском цену "..гораздо меньше 300 тыщ $..".
Кое где и 100000 проскакивало.
Так же как и лицензию на его производство.

Цитата: Старый от 06.06.2023 19:45:50Когда я вижу эти ракеты подвешенные под Боинг-747, Локхид-1011 не говоря уж о Птице Рух то вижу только одно: гора родила мышь. А уж когда вижу массу ПН на орбите...

Цитата: Astro Cat от 07.06.2023 12:45:07Зато 1я ступень то многоразовая. Не разбивается в лепешку при каждом запуске