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ЦитироватьThe rocket in the picture is being developed by Astra Space, Inc., which was formerly known as Ventions, LLC, before the company reincorporated under its present name in September 2016, according to documents on file with the City of Alameda.

Astra Space moved into Building 397 in the Alameda Point Enterprise Zone under a license from the city on Nov. 22, 2016. In January 2017, the City Council approved a two-year lease with three one-year renewal options on Jan. 3, 2017. The base rent began at $12,134.50 per month.

"Astra Space designs, tests, manufactures, and operates next-generation launch services that will enable a new generation of global communications, earth observation, precision weather monitoring, navigation, and surveillance capabilities," according to a synopsis prepared for the council.

The company started with about 25 employees in the building with plans to grow to as many as 100 employees within five years, according to city documents.

The booster burns kerosene and liquid oxygen, the records state.

ЦитироватьAlaskan spaceport to host secretive commercial launch
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — March 20, 2018

ЦитироватьAstra Space preparing for suborbital test launch
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — April 3, 2018

ЦитироватьPAZA
 
FDC 8/2164 - AK..AIRSPACE KODIAK, AK..TEMPORARY FLIGHT
RESTRICTIONS PURSUANT TO 14 CFR SECTION 91.143 TEMPORARY FLIGHT
RESTRICTIONS ARE IN EFFECT WI AN AREA BOUNDED BY 572900N/1522100W TO
572100N/1521000W TO 571022N/1521129W TO 570946N/1521815W TO
570958N/1522347W TO 565921N/1523831W TO 565745N1524250W TO
565601N/1524813W TO 565526N/1525307W SFC-UNL DUE TO ROCKET LAUNCH
ACT. ANCHORAGE /ZAN/ ARTCC TELEPHONE 907-269-1103 IS THE FAA
CDN FACILITY. 05 APR 20:00 2018 UNTIL 06 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 03 APR 19:27
2018

KZAK

04/014 (A1350/18 ) - AIRSPACE DCC L-10 ASTRA LAUNCH STNR ALT RESERVATION
WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 4916N15601W TO 5054N15743W TO 5729N15221W TO
5721N15210W TO 5008N15301W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 05 APR 20:00 2018 UNTIL
06 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 04 APR 20:11 2018

PAZA

04/015 (A0148/18 ) - AIRSPACE DCC L-10 ASTRA LAUNCH STNR ALT RESERVATION
WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 4916N15601W TO 5054N15743W TO 5729N15221W TO
5721N15210W TO 5008N15301W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 05 APR 20:00 2018 UNTIL
06 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 04 APR 20:11 2018

KZAK

04/016 (A1351/18 ) - AIRSPACE DCC L-10 ASTRA LAUNCH BACKUP STNR ALT
RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 4916N15601W TO 5054N15743W TO
5729N15221W TO 5721N15210W TO 5008N15301W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 06 APR
20:00 2018 UNTIL 07 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 04 APR 20:37 2018
 
04/017 (A1352/18 ) - AIRSPACE DCC L-10 ASTRA LAUNCH BACKUP STNR ALT
RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 4916N15601W TO 5054N15743W TO
5729N15221W TO 5721N15210W TO 5008N15301W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 07 APR
20:00 2018 UNTIL 08 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 04 APR 20:37 2018

PAZA

04/018 (A0149/18 ) - AIRSPACE DCC L-10 ASTRA LAUNCH BACKUP STNR ALT
RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 4916N15601W TO 5054N15743W TO
5729N15221W TO 5721N15210W TO 5008N15301W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 06 APR
20:00 2018 UNTIL 07 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 04 APR 20:37 2018
 
04/019 (A0150/18 ) - AIRSPACE DCC L-10 ASTRA LAUNCH BACKUP STNR ALT
RESERVATION WI AN AREA DEFINED AS 4916N15601W TO 5054N15743W TO
5729N15221W TO 5721N15210W TO 5008N15301W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 07 APR
20:00 2018 UNTIL 08 APR 02:00 2018. CREATED: 04 APR 20:37 2018

ЦитироватьДмитрий Инфан пишет:
А пуск когда?

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185936.jpg)The FAA‏Подлинная учетная запись @FAANews (https://twitter.com/FAANews) 3 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/FAANews/status/981915142601564160)

Astra Space plans to launch Rocket 1 on April 6 at the Pacific Spaceport Complex, #Alaska (https://twitter.com/hashtag/Alaska?src=hash). This is an #FAA (https://twitter.com/hashtag/FAA?src=hash)-licensed launch. Learn more: http://bit.ly/2qapfmj  (https://t.co/YVRgwj5ZcG) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/125513.png)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/162449.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 5 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/982396573127663616)

Launched scrubbed. More info to come.

3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/982423619119661057)

Astra Space launch scrubbed minutes before launch. "It's very disappointing," said Bruce Walter, spaceport facilities director. Full story in Monday's @kodiakmirror (https://twitter.com/kodiakmirror)

ЦитироватьTwo commercial suborbital launches delayed
by Jeff Foust (http://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — April 11, 2018

WASHINGTON — Two commercial suborbital launches scheduled for late last week, one a test flight of an orbital launch vehicle and the other of a suborbital research vehicle, have been postponed.

Astra Space was scheduled to perform a suborbital test flight of "Rocket 1," a small orbital vehicle the stealthy California company is developing, from Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska on April 6, based on airspace restrictions published by the Federal Aviation Administration and a notice to mariners by the U.S. Coast Guard (http://spacenews.com/astra-space-preparing-for-suborbital-test-launch/).

However, the launch was scrubbed in the final minutes before liftoff, according to a report from a local newspaper, the Kodiak Daily Mirror. The company did not disclose the cause of the scrub, and Alaska Aerospace Corporation, which operates the spaceport on Kodiak Island, did not respond to a request for comment April 9.

A new launch date has not been announced for the mission. Industry sources report that company personnel who traveled to Alaska to support the launch have left, suggesting a new launch attempt is not imminent.

ЦитироватьRocket launch at Kodiak spaceport complex scheduled for May

The Associated Press

April 28, 2018 02:30 PM
Updated April 28, 2018 02:31 PM

KODIAK, ALASKA
After being canceled just minutes before liftoff, a test rocket manufactured by California-based Astra Space Inc. is scheduled to launch from Kodiak next month.

Officials at the Pacific Spaceport Complex did not give a cause for why an April 6 was scrubbed earlier this month, but confirmed the decision was not related to the spaceport facilities, the Kodiak Daily Mirror reported Friday.

The new launch is scheduled for May 10 or May 11, said Mike Morton, a director of the Alaska Aerospace Corp.

Спойлер

Astra has not yet filed a license with the Federal Aviation Administration for the upcoming launch, so it was unclear if any changes to the launch vehicle would be made.

The documents filed last month for the previous planned launch indicated that Astra was authorized to send up a suborbital vehicle to carry "an inert upper stage on a suborbital trajectory without a payload."

An inert upper stage module does not travel into space, the Daily Mirror reported.

Astra was incorporated in 2016 and is based out of Alameda, California.

The company operates out of a 17,000-square-foot (1,579-square-meter) facility formerly occupied by the U.S. Navy. A lease agreement filed with the California city states that the space company "designs, tests, manufactures and operates" launch equipment for transporting satellites.

The relatively secretive Astra lists itself as "Stealth Space Company" in public job postings. The newspaper could not reach Astra for comment.

[свернуть]

ЦитироватьPAZA

05/083 (A0200/18) - AIRSPACE DCC ASTRA STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREADEFINED AS 5043N15801W TO 5547N15349W TO 5704N15246W TO 5727N15221WTO 5721N15216W TO 5650N15216W TO 5547N15226W TO 4941N15256W TO4940N15559W TO 5043N15801W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 10 MAY 20:00 2018 UNTIL11 MAY 02:00 2018. CREATED: 07 MAY 17:24 201

FDC 8/1924 - AK..AIRSPACE KODIAK, AK.. TEMPORARY FLIGHTRESTRICTIONS PURSUANT TO 14 CFR SECTION 91.143 TEMPORARY FLIGHTRESTRICTIONS ARE IN EFFECT WI AN AREA BOUNDED BY 565539N1525129W TO565527N1525313W TO 570400N1524600W TO 572700N1522100W TO572100N1521600W TO 570943N1521600W TO 570940N1522344W TO570621N1523005W TO 570149N1523458W TO 565927N1523746W TO565637N1524600W TO POINT OF ORIGIN. SFC-UNL DUE TO ROCKET LAUNCH ACT. ANCHORAGE /ZAN/ ARTCC TELEPHONE 907-269-1103 IS THE FAA CDN FACILITY. DLY 2000-0200. 10 MAY 20:00 2018 UNTIL 12 MAY 02:00 2018. CREATED: 08 MAY 14:172018


KZAK

05/082 (A1771/18) - AIRSPACE DCC ASTRA STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREADEFINED AS 5043N15801W TO 5547N15349W TO 5704N15246W TO 5727N15221WTO 5721N15216W TO 5650N15216W TO 5547N15226W TO 4941N15256W TO4940N15559W TO 5043N15801W TO POINT OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 10 MAY 20:00 2018 UNTIL11 MAY 02:00 2018. CREATED: 07 MAY 17:23 2018

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 11 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/994979218231562246)

Clear skies for Calif.-based Astra Space's suborbital launch of "Rocket 1" from Kodiak today. Launch window from 12p - 6pm. Will be on here with updates -- stay tuned !

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 1 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/995021600385740800)

Welp, clouds have rolled in and it is now raining here at the Pacific Spaceport Complex. Launch still on, according to a spaceport enployee.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/163334.jpg)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 23 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/995031889898426368)

Launch window for Rocket One listed on Coast Guard notice to mariners as today or tomorrow. An FCC application filed by Astra extends window to Monday. Spaceport operations said count would occur today.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 5 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/995038749258993664)

aaaand no launch today. More info to come.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 4 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/995042592239771648)

Loud boom, no rocket in the air. Aborted for the day.

3 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/995042738709020673)

Source tells me no damage to the vehicle.

ЦитироватьДимитър пишет:
Что там?

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185372.jpg)Kodiak Daily Mirror‏ @kodiakmirror (https://twitter.com/kodiakmirror) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/kodiakmirror/status/996072761582915585)

Rocket launch canceled http://www.kodiakdailymirror.com/news/article_67dbece2-571a-11e8-8eff-d35827fe4b34.html ... (https://t.co/E6lFwBi3tr)

ЦитироватьRocket launch canceled

Posted: Monday, May 14, 2018 9:00 am | Updated: 9:00 am, Mon May 14, 2018.
By GABE STUTMAN gabe@kodiakdailymirror.com (mailto:gabe@kodiakdailymirror.com) | 0 comments (http://www.kodiakdailymirror.com/news/article_67dbece2-571a-11e8-8eff-d35827fe4b34.html#user-comment-area)

A scheduled rocket launch from the Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska was canceled over the weekend. 

According to a license issued March 30 by the Federal Aviation Administration, Astra Space, Inc., was authorized for a suborbital flight of its Rocket 1 launch vehicle from Launch Pad 2 at the Kodiak spaceport. ...

ЦитироватьCommercial spaceflight company to attempt July launch

Posted: Friday, June 22, 2018 11:27 am | Updated: 11:38 am, Fri Jun 22, 2018.
Gabe Stutman, gabe@kodiakdailymirror.com (mailto:gabe@kodiakdailymirror.com)

KODIAK - A commercial spaceflight company will make its third launch attempt from the Kodiak spaceport sometime between July 14-20, according to the Alaska Aerospace Corporation.

If successful, it would be the first commercial launch ever from the spaceport at Narrow Cape.
...

ЦитироватьPAZA

FDC 8/2540 (A0351/18) - AK..AIRSPACE KODIAK, AK..TEMPORARY FLIGHT
RESTRICTIONS PURSUANT TO 14 CFR SECTION 91.143 TEMPORARY FLIGHT
RESTRICTIONS ARE IN EFFECT WI AN AREA BOUNDED BY 561722N/1540259W TO
561725N/1540924W TO 573200N/1521900W TO 572900N/1520800W TO
571202N/1520442W TO 571057N/1520815W TO 571010N/1521217W TO
570943N/1521740W TO 570943N/1522144W TO 570958N/1522347W TO
570814N/1522628W TO 570604N/1523106W TO 570229N/1523356W TO
570008N/1523722W TO 565748N/1524158W TO 565545N/1525003W TO
565518N/1525407W TO 565242N/1525645W TO 564957N/1530203W TO
564817N/1530944W TO 564734N/1531449W TO 564413N/1532012W TO
564247N/1532453W TO 564133N/1532926W TO 563737N/1533136W TO
563348N/1533034W TO 562932N/1533021W TO 562404N/1533536W TO
561851N/1534735W TO 561742N/1535641W TO POINT OF ORIGIN. SFC-UNL DUE
TO ROCKET LAUNCH ACT. ANCHORAGE /ZAN/ ARTCC TELEPHONE 907-269-1103
IS THE FAA CDN FACILITY. DLY 2000-0200. 14 JUL 20:00 2018 UNTIL 21 JUL 02:00
 2018. CREATED: 11 JUL 18:12 2018

07/058 (A0345/18) - AIRSPACE DCC ASTRA STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREA
DEFINED AS 4930N15633W TO 5111N15729W TO 5617N15410W TO 5732N15219W
TO 5729N15208W TO 5427N15135W TO 5020N15257W TO 4924N15553W TO POINT
OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 14 JUL 20:00 2018 UNTIL 15 JUL 02:00 2018. CREATED: 11 JUL
 10:37 2018


KZAK

07/057 (A2643/18) - AIRSPACE DCC ASTRA STNR ALT RESERVATION WI AN AREA
DEFINED AS 4930N15633W TO 5111N15729W TO 5617N15410W TO 5732N15219W
TO 5729N15208W TO 5427N15135W TO 5020N15257W TO 4924N15553W TO POINT
OF ORIGIN SFC-UNL. 14 JUL 20:00 2018 UNTIL 15 JUL 02:00 2018. CREATED: 11 JUL
 10:37 2018

ЦитироватьPAZA

A0360/18 - HAZARD POSSIBLE FM FALLING ROCKET DEBRIS WI AN AREA BOUNDED BY
4930N15633W TO 5111N15729W TO 5617N15410W TO 5732N15219W TO
5729N15208W TO 5427N15135W TO 5020N15257W TO 4924N15553W TO POINT OF
ORIGIN. ACFT OPERATING ON ATC CLR WILL BE RE-ROUTED AROUND HAZARD
AREA. OTHER ACFT ADZ TO AVOID OVERFLIGHT.
ALSO SEE PAZA TFR NOTAMS. REFER QUESTIONS TO ANCHORAGE /ZAN/ ARTCC
TFC MANAGEMENT AT (907)-269-1108. SFC - UNL, DLY 2000-0200, 15 JUL 20:00 2018
 UNTIL 21 JUL 02:00 2018. CREATED: 12 JUL 23:16 2018

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 3 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/1018586527301947392)

Astra to try again today from Kodiak. Partly cloudy, light breeze. Licensed for suborbital test launch.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185372.jpg)Kodiak Daily Mirror‏ @kodiakmirror (https://twitter.com/kodiakmirror) 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/kodiakmirror/status/1019695810664173573)

In what's become a familiar scene for observers at the #Kodiak (https://twitter.com/hashtag/Kodiak?src=hash) #Spaceport (https://twitter.com/hashtag/Spaceport?src=hash), a test commercial #rocket (https://twitter.com/hashtag/rocket?src=hash) launch was scrubbed over the weekend.

@kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) has the story: http://bit.ly/2mqkzY1  (https://t.co/NjCQwAgruF)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/166481.jpg)

ЦитироватьCommercial rocket launch pushed
Posted: Wednesday, July 18, 2018 9:00 am | Updated: 11:28 am, Wed Jul 18, 2018

By GABE STUTMAN gabe@kodiakdailymirror.com (mailto:gabe@kodiakdailymirror.com)

KODIAK — In what's become a familiar scene for observers at the Kodiak spaceport, a commercial rocket launch was scrubbed the day of a planned flight test over the weekend.

A private company's suborbital rocket test was all sound, no fury after a loud boom was heard around 2:25 p.m. under partly cloudy skies, but no rocket was visible from the spaceport's viewing area.
...

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 4 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/1020469573605384192)

BREAKING: Kodiak's first commercial launch occurred this afternoon at the Pacific Spaceport Complex around 2:00 p.m. Heavy fog blocked visibility. The Calif.-based Astra Space was licensed for a sub-orbital flight test of its Rocket 1 vehicle. Result of the test unclear

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186335.jpg)Gabe Stutman‏ @kdmgabe (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe) 11 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/kdmgabe/status/1020421627333337088)

Serious fog cover on the final day of Astra's launch window

https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1020421602876375040/pu/vid/480x480/Vay88jMAo9Bd_FPu.mp4?tag=3 (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1020421602876375040/pu/vid/480x480/Vay88jMAo9Bd_FPu.mp4?tag=3)
(video (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1020421602876375040/pu/vid/480x480/Vay88jMAo9Bd_FPu.mp4?tag=3) 0:04)

Цитировать https://spacenews.com/alaska-launch-shrouded-in-secrecy/
Alaska launch shrouded in secrecy
by Jeff Foust (https://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — July 27, 2018

WASHINGTON — A secretive California company carried out a suborbital launch from an Alaska spaceport July 20, but a week after the event few details about the event are clear, including its outcome.

Astra Space carried out a launch at 6 p.m. Eastern July 20 of its "Rocket 1" vehicle from Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska on Kodiak Island, Alaska. Foggy conditions made it difficult to observe the launch, according to one local reporter covering the event.
...
In a statement provided by the FAA July 24 in response to a SpaceNews inquiry, it confirmed that the launch took place but that a "mishap" of some kind occurred.

"The Astra Space, Inc. launch from the Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska at Kodiak Island on Friday, July 20 experienced a mishap," the FAA stated. "It was an FAA-licensed launch, and the agency is reviewing the event."

Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska, formerly known as the Kodiak Launch Complex, is operated by Alaska Aerospace Corporation. Craig Campbell, president and chief executive of Alaska Aerospace, told SpaceNews July 27 that a nondisclosure agreement with the customer limited what he could discuss.

"Our customer has requested we not discuss their operations with the press," he said. "I can confirm that a launch from the Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska occurred on Friday, July 20th and that the customer is very pleased with the outcome of the launch."

Campbell made no mention of a mishap or other incident taking place during the launch. "While a post-launch team is reviewing the results of the launch, I can state that there was no material damage to our facilities as a result of this launch," he said. "We look forward to working with this customer to support their next launch from Alaska."
...

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67516.jpg)Jonathan McDowell‏Подлинная учетная запись @planet4589 (https://twitter.com/planet4589) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1023716996939227136)

I infer from the FAA's 'mishap' statement that the Astra Rocket 1 flight ended at fairly low altitude and did not reach space (otherwise it would be reported as 'underperformance' at worst).

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 30 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1051957954927357953)

The FAA has issued a NOTAM for airspace closures in the vicinity of Kodiak Island tomorrow for "rocket launch activity"; presumably, another launch attempt by secretive Astra Space. http://bit.ly/2OsHuT5  (https://t.co/ztSEwZSF5a)

ЦитироватьLocation :   KODIAK, Alaska
Beginning Date and Time :   October 16, 2018 at 2000 UTC
Ending Date and Time :   October 16, 2018 at 2359 UTC
Reason for NOTAM :   DUE TO ROCKET LAUNCH ACT

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/1052297659837497345)

Astra Space has a new FAA launch license (signed Monday) for its "Rocket 2" mission: again suborbital, with a mass simulator for its upper stage:

http://bit.ly/2NKZcMr  (https://t.co/W2mN40rNmb)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1055491675219476486)

There's a new NOTAM for airspace closures downrange from Kodiak Island, Alaska, for a rocket launch, starting Friday.

http://bit.ly/2ELjYMv  (https://t.co/1DrHyN2OBN)

Цитировать

NOTAM Number :	FDC 8/1930 Download shapefiles (http://tfr.faa.gov/save_pages/8_1930.shp.zip)
Issue Date :	October 25, 2018 at 1547 UTC
Location :	KODIAK, Alaska
Beginning Date and Time :	October 26, 2018 UTC 2200-0230 Daily
Ending Date and Time :	November 02, 2018 UTC
Reason for NOTAM :	DUE TO ROCKET LAUNCH ACT
Type :	Space Operations

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/29262.jpg)Jeff Foust‏ @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust) 8:37 (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1067094949303328771) - 26 нояб. 2018 г.

Interesting: another airspace closure in the vicinity of Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska on Kodiak Island "due to rocket launch" starting Thursday: http://bit.ly/2P61Blk (https://t.co/NOi18DQTus)

Цитировать

NOTAM Number :	FDC 8/0659 Download shapefiles (http://tfr.faa.gov/save_pages/8_0659.shp.zip)
Issue Date :	November 26, 2018 at 1504 UTC
Location :	KODIAK, Alaska
Beginning Date and Time :	November 29, 2018 UTC 0030-0500 Daily
Ending Date and Time :	December 01, 2018 UTC
Reason for NOTAM :	DUE TO ROCKET LAUNCH
Type :	Space Operations

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/184888.jpg)LaunchStuff‏ @LaunchStuff (https://twitter.com/LaunchStuff) 3 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/LaunchStuff/status/1068481554547204096)

Missed launch: The SuprSekrit launch service provider Astra Space had their second flight on the 29th from the Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska. Details unknown due to SuprSekrit.

https://www.faa.gov/data_research/commercial_space_data/launches/?type=Licensed ... (https://t.co/htZXJl1WFf)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/172862.jpg)

ЦитироватьRocket launch scrubbed on Wednesday

Posted: Thursday, November 29, 2018 9:22 am
By JACK BARNWELL jack@kodiakdailymirror.com (mailto:jack@kodiakdailymirror.com) 

KODIAK — A planned rocket launch by Astra Space Inc. at Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska was scrubbed Wednesday afternoon.

Barry King, director of range operations for Alaska Aerospace Corporation, confirmed the scrub but declined to comment on why the launch didn't go forward. King also declined to state the specific company conducting the launch operation. However, Astra is the only company licensed by the Federal Aviation Administration to conduct commercial launch operations at Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska.

ЦитироватьAstra Space suborbital launch fails
by Jeff Foust (https://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — December 6, 2018

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/191533.jpg)
Launch facilities at Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska on Kodiak Island. Credit: Alaska Aerospace Corp.

WASHINGTON — A test flight in Alaska of a small launch vehicle by a stealthy startup company ended in failure in late November, the Federal Aviation Administration has revealed.

In a speech Dec. 6 at a U.S. Chamber of Commerce space conference here discussing the agency's approach to commercial spaceflight safety, FAA Acting Administrator Dan Elwell mentioned a recent, but previously unreported, accident involving a launch taking place from Alaska one week ago.

"The recent launch mishap is an example of why I'm confident we're on the right track," he said. "Look, rockets are complex, powerful vehicles that fail every now and again. But because of our approach to licensing and the precautions operators take, no one in the public has ever been hurt."

"We saw that in Alaska a week ago today," he continued. "Even though all five engines failed, all debris landed in the spaceport boundary and there were no injuries or property damage to the uninvolved public."

Elwell didn't provide additional details about the event, and left the conference without taking questions. However, according to the list maintained by the FAA on its website of licensed launches (https://www.faa.gov/data_research/commercial_space_data/launches/?type=license), there was a launch Nov. 29 by Astra of its "Astra Rocket 2" from Alaska. No payload is listed for that launch, and the site provides no other details about the mission.

Спойлер

A launch license the FAA issued to Astra Space Inc. on Oct. 15 (https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ast/licenses_permits/media/LLS%2018-114%20Rocket%202%20(PSCA)%20Signed%20(2018-10-15).pdf), also available on the FAA website, authorized the company to perform a suborbital flight of its "Rocket 2" vehicle from Launch Pad 2 at Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska, the commercial launch site on Kodiak Island, Alaska, operated by Alaska Aerospace Corp.

The launch featured a first stage but an "upper stage mass simulator" in place of an active upper stage. The rocket was intended to fly on an azimuth of 195 degrees, or slightly west of due south, from the spaceport, but the license did not disclose the planned altitude or downrange distance for the mission.

As the name suggests, the launch was the second for Astra Space. The company performed an initial suborbital launch (https://spacenews.com/alaska-launch-shrouded-in-secrecy/), also from Kodiak, July 20. The launch took place in foggy conditions and the outcome was also shrouded in secrecy: the FAA said that launch suffered an unspecified "mishap" but Alaska Aerospace Corp. said the customer for that launch, which it declined to disclose citing a nondisclosure agreement, was "very pleased with the outcome of the launch."

Alaska Aerospace Corp. did not immediately respond to a request for comment Dec. 6 about the Nov. 29 launch accident. An FAA source, speaking on background, said the accident caused no damage to the spaceport.

Astra Space has also not commented on the launch failure. The company, based in Alameda, California, has been working on a small launch vehicle capable of placing 100 kilograms into low Earth orbit, according to documents included with its lease agreement with the city of Alameda for a building the company uses. The company has maintained a low profile (https://spacenews.com/alaskan-spaceport-to-host-secretive-commercial-launch/), identifying itself as "Stealth Space Company" in some job listings

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Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185926.jpg) Mark Harris‏ Подлинная учетная запись @meharris (https://twitter.com/meharris) 39 мин.39 минут назад (https://twitter.com/meharris/status/1178686940947701760)

Scoop: Astra Space's tests contaminated hundreds of tonnes of soil & damaged a building at the Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska on Kodiak Island. My latest for @newscientist (https://twitter.com/newscientist) [paywall]
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2218048-revealed-rocket-test-at-alaskan-spaceport-polluted-230-tonnes-of-soil/ ... (https://t.co/jheobHMm5x)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/177224.jpg)


37 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/meharris/status/1178687437532323841)

I got Astra on the record for the first time. They say both test flights last year were successful, but that both ended early. Both landed on spaceport land, requiring over 230 tonnes of soil to be removed to the mainland for decontamination.


34 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/meharris/status/1178688186375008257)

Debris from the first flight in July also damaged exterior panels on PSCA's Integration & Processing Facility. The damage was fixed by early spring this year. This damage increased insurance costs for @vectorlaunch (https://twitter.com/vectorlaunch) - one of the reasons it did not launch from PSCA last year.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/177225.jpg)


 29 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/meharris/status/1178689611310088192)

The boss of PSCA at the time told @SpaceNews_Inc (https://twitter.com/SpaceNews_Inc) that the launch had caused "no material damage to our facilities." However, minutes from a spaceport board meeting had a section entitled "Facility Damage Report from 7.20.18 launch". https://spacenews.com/alaska-launch-shrouded-in-secrecy/ ... (https://t.co/vqTVOrbno9)


25 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/meharris/status/1178690462846046208)

Remember how an FAA official said all 5 of Astra's rocket engines failed on its 2nd flight (another great story by @jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust))? Astra says that was incorrect. 2 engines on the rocket failed, the remainder were shut down to maintain trajectory.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/177227.jpg)

ЦитироватьRevealed: Rocket test at Alaskan spaceport polluted 230 tonnes of soil
30 September 2019
By Mark Harris (https://www.newscientist.com/author/mark-harris/)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/141169.webp)
The Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska is in an isolated spot
NASA/Alaska Aerospace Corporation

Last year, Astra Space began its first rocket test launches at one of the most isolated spaceports in the world. Until now, it had seemed that the rockets failed to launch. But New Scientist has learned that the rockets did take off — before malfunctioning and damaging the spaceport. Remediation work has included sending more than 200 tonnes of soil for decontamination. ...

Цитировать

10 Jan 2020 | 19:40 GMT
FCC Filing Confirms Final Contestant in DARPA's $12 Million Satellite Launch Challenge
Astra Space, the sole remaining participant, gets early notice of the competition launch site
By Mark Harris (https://spectrum.ieee.org/author/mark-harris)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/191738.jpg)
Illustration: iStockphotoEditor's Picks

In 2018, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (https://www.darpa.mil/) (DARPA) announced the multi-million-dollar DARPA Launch Challenge (https://www.darpalaunchchallenge.org/) to promote rapid access to space within days rather than years. To earn prizes totaling more than US $12 million, rocket companies would have to launch unfamiliar satellites fr om two sites in quick succession.

"The launch environment of tomorrow will more closely resemble that of airline operations—with frequent launches from a myriad of locations worldwide," said Todd Master (https://www.darpa.mil/staff/mr-todd-master), DARPA's program manager for the competition at the time. The U.S. military relies on space-based systems for much of its navigation and surveillance needs, and wants a way to quickly replace damaged or destroyed satellites in the future. At the moment, it takes at least three years to build, test, and launch spacecraft.

To ensure that DARPA was incentivizing the flexible, responsive launch technologies the U.S. military needs, competitors would receive information about the site of their next launch fewer than 30 days prior to each flight, DARPA's rules stated (https://www.darpalaunchchallenge.org/wp-content/uploads/20190312-Launch-Challenge-Guidelines_Rev6_clean.pdf), and only learn their actual payloads two weeks out. 

While 18 companies impressed DARPA enough to pre-qualify, just three startups overcame the Challenge's first hurdle by securing a launch license from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (https://www.faa.gov/).

Vector Launch (https://vector-launch.com/) had already flown prototype rockets on sub-orbital missions, and  URL=https://virginorbit.com/]Virgin Orbit[/URL] was developing an air-launched rocket that would be carried aloft by a modified Virgin Atlantic 747. The third qualifier was a space startup that asked to remain anonymous. In April 2019, each company received $400,000 to help them advance to the launch phase.

It was too little, too late for Vector, which in August replaced its founding CEO, Jim Cantrell (http://www.jimcantrell.com/), and suspended operations amid financial difficulties. In October, Virgin Orbit also pulled out, writing: "After comparing DARPA's requested timeline with our commitments to our commercial and government customers, we have elected to withdraw from the competition."

That left the hopes of the U.S. military resting on a mysterious space company still operating in stealth mode.

According to a recent filing at the FCC (https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/STA_Print.cfm?mode=current&application_seq=97422&RequestTimeout=1000), the last startup standing in the Launch Challenge is actually Astra Space, a secretive Bay Area company that has won dozens of U.S. government contracts from NASA and the Pentagon. Astra Space does not even have a website, and calls itself a "stealth space company (https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/search/?keywords=stealth%20space%20company)" in job listings.

Last year, Astra Space launched its first two sub-orbital rocket missions from the remote Pacific Spaceport Complex-Alaska (PSCA) (https://akaerospace.com/capabilities/pacific-spaceport-complex-alaska-psca) on Kodiak Island. Neither flight was a complete success (https://www.newscientist.com/article/2218048-exclusive-rocket-test-in-alaska-polluted-230-tonnes-of-soil/). The first resulted in minor damage to a rocket processing facility, and debris from both launches caused environmental damage that required hundreds of tons of soil to be removed for remediation.

In December, Astra Space was granted permission by the FCC for its first orbital rocket flight at PSCA. This will involve launching a small experimental satellite called GEARRS3, developed in part by the Air Force Research Laboratory (https://www.wpafb.af.mil/afrl/).

Quick on the heels of that, Astra Space requested permission this week for another orbital launch, from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility (https://www.nasa.gov/centers/wallops/home) on the eastern shore of Virginia. In its application (https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/STA_Print.cfm?mode=current&application_seq=97422&RequestTimeout=1000), Astra Space noted: "The operation is to launch a small satellite into low earth orbit. This will be a launch... in support of the DARPA Challenge."

(https://spectrum.ieee.org/image/MzU1MDEzNQ.jpeg)
Credit: Astra Space/FCC
Schematic of the latest version of Astra Space's orbital launch vehicle.

Under Launch Challenge rules, Astra Space should only have been informed of the launch site at most 30 days before making its attempt. Astra Space's FCC paperwork, however, states an earliest launch date of 1 March 2020, giving Astra Space at least 55 days to prepare. The paperwork even requests permission to launch as late as the start of September.

Attempting to compress multi-year launch preparations into weeks "was always a bridge too far," says Cantrell, ex-CEO of Vector. "From a purely physical point of view, we could string up a rocket up in our backyard and launch it, but the reality of the regulatory environment forces more of a six-to-12-month decision. We gave [DARPA] the feedback, gently, that it was not realistic."

"We have made some amendments to timelines to allow compliance with national policy and regulatory requirements, while still meeting our goals of being responsive," says Master. Although Astra Space will know wh ere it will fly from, it will only receive its final trajectory 30 days prior to launch, and only receive the actual spacecraft a few days before.

Since qualifying for the Launch Challenge, Astra Space's original FAA launch license expired. A fresh license (https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ast/licenses_permits/media/LLS%2020-118,%20Rocket%20v3.0%20(PSCA),%20Signed%20(2020-01-09)1.pdf) [PDF], issued this week, allows Astra Space to use a new version of its rocket for its first orbital attempt—but only from PSCA in Alaska. It would need a modification of this license for its DARPA flight at Wallops, potentially adding another delay.

Astra Space did not immediately reply to requests for comment.

Despite the Launch Challenge loosening its rules and losing almost all its participants, Cantrell remains supportive of DARPA's efforts. "They're really pushing the boundaries and trying to break the rules of how things have always been done," he says.

Цитировать3 февраля 2020 г., 13:00
A SMALL ROCKET MAKER
IS RUNNING A DIFFERENT KIND OF SPACE RACE

Astra, Darpa's rocket startup of choice, is preparing to launch satellites into orbit in record time

By Ashlee Vance 
Photographs by Jason Henry

Video (https://www.bloomberg.com/bbg-gfx/video_loops/2020_test_astra/bopfpf0pa40c72p8eq3g/Astra_motion_01__1920.webm)
▲ Astra's rocket named "One of Three" undergoes late night testing in Alameda, Calif.

The 40-foot-long, 4-foot-wide rocket loomed over the quiet suburb of Alameda, Calif., on the morning of Jan. 18, near the Pottery Barn Outlet. A handful of engineers and metal wrenchers got to work early, setting up the rocket and connecting it to a mess of electronics and tubes. The device stood up straight, with the help of some black metal scaffolding. Its bottom third gleamed aluminum; the rest, actor-teeth white. Over the course of the day, the team pumped in various gases and liquids to prepare the rocket's valves, chambers, and other components for a crucial test.

Shortly after midnight, the rocket was ready for an exercise called a cold flow, meant to ensure that its propellant tanks can handle liquid fuel. Once the team had filled the rocket, taken the needed measurements, and checked for leaks, they simply evacuated the machine by releasing huge volumes of liquid nitrogen into the air. The thing about liquid nitrogen is that it must be kept supercold to remain liquid. It boiled instantly on contact with the outside air, creating a billowing white cloud that stretched out more than 200 yards. With the team's floodlights beaming down on the test site, this odd fog monster easily could have been seen by anyone living in the houses as close as 2,000 feet away. Soon, though, the rocket was trucked off toward its next temporary home, a spaceport in Kodiak, Alaska.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/126071.jpg)
▲ Adam London (left) and Chris Kemp (right), the cofounders of Astra, inside a rocket engine test chamber

Until speaking with Bloomberg Businessweek, Astra, the three-year-old rocket startup behind the test, had operated in secret, rolling nitrogen clouds aside. The company's founders say they want to be the FedEx Corp. of space. They're aiming to create small, cheap rockets that can be mass-produced to facilitate daily spaceflights, delivering satellites into low-Earth orbit for as little as $1 million per launch. If Astra's planned Kodiak flight succeeds on Feb. 21, it will have put a rocket into orbit at a record-setting pace. Chief Executive Officer Chris Kemp says he's focused less on this particular launch than on the logistics of creating many more rockets. "We have taken a much broader look at how we scale the business," he says.

Going fast in the aerospace business is a rarity and doesn't usually work out so well. But the U.S. government has made speedy rocket launches something of a national priority, and Astra stands as a Department of Defense darling right now. The Pentagon's R&D arm, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or Darpa, made Astra one of three finalists in a contest called the Launch Challenge. The terms: Whichever startup could send two rockets fr om different locations with different payloads within a few weeks of each other would win $12 million.

Astra is the only finalist still in the running. Virgin Orbit, part of billionaire Richard Branson's spaceflight empire that's been working on its rocket for about a decade, has withdrawn from the contest. Vector Launch Inc., the third finalist, filed for bankruptcy in December. That's left Astra in a competition against itself and physics, which may be why Kemp, a relentless ball of confident energy who dresses in head-to-toe black, is uncharacteristically trying to set modest expectations for the Kodiak launch.

Video (https://www.bloomberg.com/bbg-gfx/video_loops/2020_test_astra/bopfqhopa40c72p8eq4g/astra_motion_03F__1920.webm)
▲ Workers mount the five engines that power the rocket's first stage

"It would be unprecedented if this was a successful orbital flight," he says. "We want to emphasize that this is one of many launches we will do in an ongoing campaign."

The 42-year-old CEO spent almost five years at NASA, but he's not a rocket scientist by training. He joined NASA in 2007 after running a string of internet startups, eventually becoming the space agency's chief technology officer. While at NASA he shepherded an open source software project called Open Stack, which turned into a data center and cloud computing phenomenon. He left in 2011, hoping to capitalize on Open Stack's success, but his next company, Nebula, found itself outgunned by Amazon.com Inc.'s cloud computing services; Oracle Corp. acquired Nebula's piece parts in 2015. Unsure what to do next, he spent a couple of years hunting for fresh ideas, which is when he ran into Adam London, Astra's co-founder and CTO.

London is the rocket man, a 46-year-old with a doctorate in aerospace engineering from MIT and a talent for calculating drag coefficients and gravity losses in his head. He spent 12 years running a small rocket company called Ventions in the heart of San Francisco. Ventions's handful of employees focused on miniaturizing rocket technology in their makeshift lab, living on NASA and Darpa contracts and the odd consulting gig. By 2016, London had grown determined to build the rocket of his dreams, but he needed a lot more capital. Kemp and his talent for winning over investors seemed like a good match, so after many chats, they joined forces. "I liked Chris's enthusiasm, his ability to think about the story, and certainly his network," says London, the measured counterpoint to Kemp's bravado.[

The rest of Astra's 150-person team includes some legit aerospace veterans—former SpaceX employees such as Chris Thompson (part of the SpaceX founding team), Matt Lehman (propulsion), Roger Carlson (the Dragon capsule), and Bryson Gentile (the Falcon 9 rocket). But there's also a large contingent of people who came either from gritty, bootstrapped rocket outfits or from other fields entirely. Much of the engine building has been done by Ben Farrant, a former Navy engine man who's spent the bulk of his career in the auto racing world tuning vehicles. Les Martin, a launch and test infrastructure engineer, built test stands for SpaceX, Virgin Galactic, and Firefly Aerospace after learning electronics in the Marines. "I didn't know the first thing about rockets, whenever I got into it," he says. "But with these startups, you're involved pretty quickly in just about every single aspect.

Rocket Commerce
(https://forum.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/forum/file/113798)
DATA: SPACEX, ROCKET LAB, ASTRA

Astra has raised more than $100 million from investors including Acme, Advance, Airbus Ventures, Canaan Partners, Innovation Endeavors, and Salesforce co-founder Marc Benioff. Billions have flowed into commercial spaceflight ventures over the past few years, often to newcomers that, like Astra, have shied away from competing directly with Elon Musk's SpaceX and government-backed makers of large rockets.

The jumbo end of the market centers on rockets that fly roughly once a month and cost $60 million to $300 million per launch, typically carrying tons of cargo. Astra says its daily launches, meant to carry about 450 pounds of cargo to orbit, will be pitched to the dozens of companies making a new breed of small satellites, such as Planet Labs, Spire Global, and Swarm Technologies.

Whereas conventional orbital networks are composed of a relative handful of satellites the size of a car, Planet and its rivals produce tens to hundreds of basketball-size satellites for use in very specific orbits to photograph, track, and connect things on Earth in near-real time. At the moment no one really knows how big or viable the market for smaller rockets to ferry these satellites might be. Rocket Lab, a company founded by Peter Beck in Auckland in 2006, is the only small-rocket maker that's actively launching. Rocket Lab enjoyed a banner 2019, putting six rockets into space, and has about a dozen more launches scheduled for this year. Its success has placed immense pressure on companies such as Astra and Virgin Orbit to catch up.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/126074.jpg)
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/126072.jpg)
▲ A rocket factory coming to life inside of a 250,000 square foot-facility next to an Alameda neighborhood

Astra has operated in secrecy partly to avoid being pushed to set unrealistic deadlines. Most of its workers have online résumés that list their employer as "Stealth Space Company," and there hasn't been a website. At the former Alameda Naval Air Station, Astra took over a decrepit building used decades ago to test jet engines indoors, which has helped keep its secrecy intact. The facility has two long tunnels that send fire and scorching hot air up through exhaust towers and thick concrete walls capable of absorbing the explosive impacts of tests gone wrong.

This setup has allowed Astra to conduct thousands of runs on its rocket engines without its neighbors noticing much of anything. It's also meant Astra can put the engines through their paces on-site and make adjustments to the hardware quickly, instead of going to the Mojave Desert or an open field in Texas wh ere other rocket makers typically run engine trials.

Kemp says that Rocket Lab's going launch rate of about $7.5 million a pop is too high and that the company's Electron rocket has been overengineered. Instead of using carbon fiber for the rocket body and fancy 3D-printed parts as Rocket Lab does, Astra has stuck with aluminum and simplified engines built with common tools. London's team has tried to make the Astra radios, igniters, and even the rocket transport vehicle low-cost, high-performing, and easy to re-create.

Alongside its rocket test building, Astra has been assembling a 250,000-square-foot manufacturing facility that Kemp says will be able to churn out hundreds of rockets a year. "Our strategy is to always focus on the bottom line," he says. "Nothing is sacred. We're able to profitably deliver payloads at $2.5 million per launch, and our intent is to continue to lower that price and increase the performance of our system."

The proof is in the orbital launch. Most spaceflight companies' first crafts go boom in a bad way, but Rocket Lab has an almost flawless launch record. Beck, a self-taught rocket engineer, says his perfectionism is a selling point. "If someone wants to build a rocket that is super inaccurate, let them," he says. "I'm not built to build shit." Astra's previous two launches, each of a smaller version of its current rocket, tumbled back onto the Kodiak coastline in 2018, breaking apart in spectacular pyrotechnic displays.

Video (https://www.bloomberg.com/bbg-gfx/video_loops/2020_test_astra/bopfqr0pa40c72p8eq50/astra_motion_04F__1920.webm)
▲ An engineer relies on a forklift to get at the rocket's electronics during testing procedures

To win the $12 million, Astra will need to place a satellite of Darpa's choosing into the right orbit. The Pentagon agency will then sel ect another launch site—probably somewhere in California, Florida, or Virginia—and give Astra a few weeks to get a fresh rocket to the new launchpad. It would be an incredibly quick turnaround for an industry in which six to 12 months is a typical time span needed to calibrate the specifics around new launch sites and payloads.

"That is what was expected," Kemp says. "Many of our objectives on those launches were achieved, and I guarantee we couldn't have built our orbital rocket in three years if the team hadn't benefited from that experience." London is more circumspect—but comparably optimistic. "I did expect or at least hoped we would be in orbit by now," he says. "But outside of things being a little harder than you would like, the broad direction and slope of things line up pretty well with our original plan."

Astra has several rocket bodies awaiting the challenge on its Alameda factory floor. Kemp says the company has signed contracts for more than a dozen launches with paying customers, and it plans to create a launchpad in the Marshall Islands to match the one in Alaska. So far, he says, there are no plans to launch directly fr om the Alameda Pottery Barn.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/44532.jpg) (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)Jeff Foust@jeff_foust (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust)  3:37 PM - Feb 3, 2020 (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1224310933142425603)

Some new details about "Stealth Space Company," aka Astra Space, which is planning its next launch as soon as Feb. 21 from Alaska:

https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2020-astra-rocket/ ... (https://t.co/VAzG1seq2m)


3:39 PM - Feb 3, 2020 (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1224311563709898752)

That launch appears to be the one referenced in a recent Coast Guard notice, which says a launch is planned that day from Kodiak between 11:30am and 3pm local time; additional launch opportunities exist daily through the end of the month.

https://www.navcen.uscg.gov/pdf/lnms/lnm17042020.pdf ... (https://t.co/NECPFlpzMH)

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/75977.jpg) (https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz) Michael Sheetz✔@thesheetztweetz (https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz) 9:07 PM - Feb 3, 2020 (https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz/status/1224393975752273921)

Astra testing its rocket at the company's 15 acre HQ on the San Francisco Bay in Alameda.

https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/EP3rz1KW4AEtJ_s.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/EP3rz1KW4AEtJ_s.mp4) (0:04)

ЦитироватьAstra emphasizes rapid iteration in its quest for low-cost, rapid launch
by Jeff Foust (https://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — February 14, 2020

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/191662.jpg)
Astra performs a test of its small launch vehicle at its Alameda, California, headquarters in an undated scene fr om a video released by the company in February. Credit: Astra

WASHINGTON — As Astra prepares for its first orbital launch attempt, the company is setting expectations accordingly and taking the long view towards its goal of frequent, low-cost access to space.

The launch window for Astra's first orbital launch fr om Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska now opens Feb. 25, according to a U.S. Coast Guard notice published Feb. 12 (https://www.navcen.uscg.gov/pdf/lnms/lnm17062020.pdf). The company will have daily windows from 3:30 to 7:00 p.m. Eastern through March 3.

In a Feb. 13 interview, Chris Kemp, chief executive of Astra, confirmed that launch window but didn't give a specific date when the company would make its first launch attempt. The rocket, dubbed "One of Three," will be flying to the spaceport on Kodiak Island, Alaska, in a few days.

That launch, he confirmed, will be the first of two missions as part of the DARPA Launch Challenge, a competition by DARPA to demonstrate responsive launch capabilities. Astra is the sole remaining competitor in the challenge after the other two finalists, Vector and Virgin Orbit, dropped out last year.

Kemp said the company has yet to receive the payload provided by DARPA that the company will launch on that mission. "I think it shows up any day now," he said. "Part of the challenge is not knowing what the payload is and integrating the payload at the last minute." He added he expected DARPA to disclose more details about the competition on or around Feb. 18.

Astra will receive $2 million if it successfully places that payload into orbit, and $10 million if it successfully performs a second launch from another site, which would be either Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia or Naval Outlying Field on San Nicolas Island off the California coast. Kemp said the company has been preparing for launching from any of those three sites, including filing an application with the Federal Communications Commission for a license supporting a Wallops launch, but has not been informed by DARPA which site they would use.

However, Kemp said that the company, which emerged from stealth mode just this month (https://spacenews.com/astra-unveils-plans-for-frequent-low-cost-launches/), was aware of the long odds of success for the first orbital launch of any rocket. "The fact that we're talking now to the press is really a function of wanting to make sure that, prior to the DARPA Launch Challenge, we don't frame everything around this first launch," he said. "It's not our expectation that our first launch will succeed, but it is our expectation that a campaign will succeed if we launch, learn and iterate."

He said he expected "a few attempts" before succeeding to place a payload in orbit. He based on that on historic estimates that it takes "somewhere between three and four" launches before a vehicle is successful. SpaceX, for example, did not make orbit until the fourth flight of its Falcon 1 rocket. However, Rocket Lab achieved orbit on its second Electron mission after a problem with range safety equipment, and not the rocket itself, on its first launch.

Astra is preparing for that by building three of its "Rocket 3.0" vehicles together. Kemp said the second rocket is about 90% complete and the third 40% complete. "We're able to produce a rocket a month," he said. "That allows us to, if this first flight isn't entirely successful, make whatever changes we'd like to make," he said. "It will not be a year before we launch again. It will be maybe a month or two before we launch again."

Once Astra does reach orbit, be it on its first launch or third, the company is ready to move ahead with a "big long list of satellites on manifest." He didn't disclose any specific customers, but said it included a mix of commercial and government customers willing to fly an untried vehicle to get they payloads into orbit.

"There's just so little supply of launches when customers want to fly and wh ere they want to fly that they're willing to launch on a rocket that has no success record," he said. "The fact that we have so many customers waiting in line without yet establishing that track record is pretty encouraging to us."

The key to Astra's success, he argued, is the ability to iterate quickly, incorporating improvements in the design of the rocket. The company has already done that through its first two rockets, suborbital vehicles launched from Alaska in 2018. The first rocket had a carbon composite nose cone, which cost about $250,000 to make, which was close to the target cost of the entire vehicle. "We could not use composites, period," he said, with the company switching to an aluminum structure that is cheaper and faster to produce.

Astra, unlike many others in the launch business, is eschewing the use of additive manufacturing, or 3-D printing. "We do 3D-print two components on the rocket today, and we are moving away from that as fast as we possibly can, because those 3D-printed components cost as much as the entire rocket."

That iteration will continue after successfully reaching orbit. Kemp said a version 4 of the rocket will be able to place 50 kilograms into a sun-synchronous orbit. "We think that is about right for wh ere the market is today," he said. He expected Astra to produce 25 of those, of which more than half have been sold.

That iteration also reflects competition from Rocket Lab's Electron. After Electron entered service Astra made changes to the design of its rocket, including new engines with double the thrust from those used on its 2.0 version of the rocket and larger tanks. "We were able to quickly respond to Rocket Lab's successful orbital flight," Kemp said. "We decided to double the mass of our rocket so we could directly compete with Rocket Lab. That is something that didn't take is five years to do or 11 years to do. It took us one year."

Future versions will be driven by market needs, including both vehicle capacity and launch rate. Astra, in an introductory video posted on its website, spoke of offering daily access to space, a goal he said provides a "north star" to guide the company's efforts that will take three to five generations of vehicles to reach.

"You get there by, frankly, iterating," he said. "With each generation of the rocket we'll have an opportunity to look at the market and understand what the demand looks like, and then design the rocket for a certain production rate."

Kemp emphasized near the end of the half-hour interview that the company won't be discouraged if its upcoming launch fails. "If this launch isn't entirely successful, we're going to go do it again," he said. "We're going to iterate towards orbit."

Цитировать(https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/1229570089474641921/TGaouJxx_bigger.jpg) Astra‏ @astra (https://twitter.com/astra) 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/astra/status/1229575401892007936)

Welcome to Astra! We're launching a new generation of space services to observe, connect, and improve life on earth.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180489.jpg)

Цитировать2020 Launch RocketOverview Astra MotionGraphics 001 5

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220501.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/user/DARPAtv) DARPAtv (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOIHBHRbvncMo7Bf0Vx1zEQ)

24 февр. 2020 г.

Цитировать2020 Launch Astra Final

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220501.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/user/DARPAtv) DARPAtv (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOIHBHRbvncMo7Bf0Vx1zEQ)

24 февр. 2020 г.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/186106.jpg) Homem do Espaço‏ @HomemDoEspacoBr (https://twitter.com/HomemDoEspacoBr) 6 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/HomemDoEspacoBr/status/1232493404904288256)

Astra Rocket will be launched in a @DARPA (https://twitter.com/DARPA) mission

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180590.jpg)


4 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/HomemDoEspacoBr/status/1232510553698054147)

Foguete Astra Rocket "1 de 3". A Astra e a Agência de Projetos de Pesquisa Avançada de Defesa (DARPA) estão se preparando para o primeiro em um "desafio de lançamento" de missão dupla.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180592.jpg)


4 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/HomemDoEspacoBr/status/1232516592078139392)

#LaunchChallenge (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LaunchChallenge?src=hash) Astra Rocket by Homem do Espaço

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180593.jpg)

ЦитироватьAstra's Secret Rocket Project Finally Reveals Itself

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220522.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/user/szyzyg) Scott Manley (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxzC4EngIsMrPmbm6Nxvb-A)

25 февр. 2020 г.

About 18 Months ago I covered Astra, a small rocket startup based only a few miles from my home. They were still a 'Stealth' company, and would not publicly acknowledge what they were doing, even after a pair of suborbital tests which failed due to engine problems. However they're now speaking publicly, and making a lot of noise about their smallsat launcher and their first orbital launch attempt only a few days from now.

ЦитироватьСтартап Astra совершит первый тестовый запуск своей ракеты для выполнения срочных заданий Пентагона
       Вашингтон. 28 февраля. ИНТЕРФАКС - Новый частный американский производитель ракет - компания Astra планирует в пятницу совершить первый тестовый запуск своего носителя легкого класса Rocket 3.0 с мини-спутниками в интересах министерства обороны США, сообщило Агентство перспективных исследовательских проектов в области обороны (DARPA).
       Запуск, который проводится в рамках конкурса DARPA, планируется осуществить с тихоокеанского космического комплекса на острове Кадьяк, расположенного у южного побережья Аляски, во временное окно с 23:30 в пятницу до 02:30 мск в субботу. В случае непогоды оно может быть расширено до 1 марта.
       Ракета Astra Rocket 3.0 представляет собой двухступенчатую ракету с пятью двигателями. Носитель может выводить на 500-километровую солнечно-синхронную орбиту до 150 кг полезной нагрузки. Длина ракеты составляет всего 11,6 метра и может транспортироваться в контейнере на любой стартовый комплекс.
       На борту Astra Rocket 3.0 размещены четыре малых спутника. Они будут выполнять роль срочного заказа на вывод на орбиту груза, который передается компании Пентагоном для установки на ее ракете, как минимум, за трое-четверо суток до старта.
       В рамках теста, в частности, планируется вывести на целевую орбиту высотой 445 км экспериментальный спутник связи Prometheus Лос-Аламосской ядерной лаборатории, двух спутников связи, созданных в университете Южной Флориды и радиомаяка Space Object Automated Reporting Systems.
       При этом в рамках конкурса DARPA запуск ракеты-носителя будет признан успешным, даже если ракета поднимется, хотя бы на высоту 150 км.
       Высокая экономичность ракеты может позволить занять Astra серьезные конкурентные позиции на рынке космических запусков. По утверждению компании, ее ракета будет самым простым и технологичным носителем в мире. Стоимость одного старта должна составлять около 2,5 млн долл. Для сравнения запуск ракеты тяжелого класса Falcon 9 компании SpaceX оценивается более чем в 60 млн долл.
      "Мы хотим получить возможность запускать полезную нагрузку на орбиту в очень короткие сроки, без предварительного уведомления о полезной нагрузке, орбиты или места запуска ", - сказал Тодд Мастер, менеджер отдела по тактическим технологиям программы "DARPA Launch Challenge".
       В случае успешного старта Astra получит от DARPA 2 млн долл. Это позволит компании получить еще 10 млн долл. при осуществлении второго успешного запуска, который уже запланирован на 18 марта.
       Компания Astra собирается осуществлять дешевые регулярные запуски космических аппаратов в интересах американских военных, которым нужны носители, способные по кратчайшим заявкам выводить на орбиту малые космические аппараты.
       Конкурс DARPA был объявлен два года назад. Изначально в нем участвовали 18 компаний. Однако по итогам осталась одна Astra.
       До конца 2020 года Astra создать 25 ракет, чтобы начать коммерческие запуски. После этого она планирует выпустить еще 100 ракет с более низкой стоимостью.

ЦитироватьDARPA Launch Challenge Launch 1 Feb 26, 2020

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/220501.jpg) (https://www.youtube.com/user/DARPAtv) DARPAtv (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOIHBHRbvncMo7Bf0Vx1zEQ)

28 февр. 2020 г.

ЦитироватьSpace books написал:
Astra выходит из тени. Дебютный запуск космической ракеты с Аляски — трансляция
https://youtu.be/2Wzagx8kC7s (https://youtu.be/2Wzagx8kC7s)


https://youtu.be/2Wzagx8kC7s (https://youtu.be/2Wzagx8kC7s)
Завтра,   29 февраля в 22:30 вечера по киевскому времени, в космическом бизнесе   дебютирует частная калифорнийская компания Astra. С площадки LP-3B   Тихоокеанского космического комплекса/Аляска она попытается запустить   ракету-носитель Rocket 3.0 с тремя наноспутниками и прибором, который  на  орбите останется закрепленным на верхней ступени.

Миссия под эгидой Минобороны США носит название "Один из трех" (One of Three).
https://youtu.be/76ck6Bw2M4k
https://youtu.be/76ck6Bw2M4k (https://youtu.be/76ck6Bw2M4k)  
DARPA  Launch Challenge - конкурс от Управления перспективных  исследовательских проектов Пентагона по гибкому/оперативному запуску  небольших полезных нагрузок в кратчайшие сроки после размещения заказа.  Объявлен в 2018-м. Задача: дважды вывести грузы на околоземную орбиту с  разных стартовых площадок в течение двух-трех недель.  Квалификационный этап из 18 участников прошли три компании —  Vector Launch, Virgin Orbit и Astra. Название последней объявили только  на днях: компания запросила анонимность на подготовительном этапе.  Vector обанкротилась, а Virgin вышла из игры. Astra получила $400 000.  Приз за успешную доставку груза на орбиту — $2 млн. Удача со вторым  быстрым запуском принесет Astra $10 млн.  Если эта миссия будет успешной, вторая по условиям конкурса  должна состояться на чуть отличную орбиту не позднее 18 марта — с другой  площадки этого же комплекса на мысе Нэрроу острова Кадьяк.  

Спутники  

Исторически военные спутники — очень дорогие и технологически  продвинутые массивные аппараты, которые разрабатывают и собирают годами.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/207120.jpg)
   В последнее время Минобороны США стремится к гораздо более  гибкому графику и возможностям присутствия в космосе, используя  небольшие спутники, а также кубсаты — аппараты, кратные размерам  10х10х10 см, или даже совсем миниатюрные — покетсаты. Их удобно  запускать на малых ракетах частников вроде Rocket Lab.  

Под головным обтекателем будут:  

Prometheus 2.5 — полуторакилограммовый коммуникационный спутник  стоимостью менее $100 000, собранный в Лос-Аламосской лаборатории США.  Срок службы — от трех до пяти лет. С его помощью военные оценят новые  недорогие методы передачи аудио-, видео- и других файлов с портативных  полевых устройств на развертываемые терминалы наземных станций с  использованием загоризонтной спутниковой связи.  ARCE-1А и ARCE-1B (Articulated Reconnaissance and  Communications Expedition) — пара кубсатов размера 0.5U от Университета  Южной Флориды для отработки межспутниковой связи с целью поиска новых  способов автономизирования глобальных коммуникаций.  SOARS (Space Object Automated Reporting Systems) — радиомаяк  компании Tiger Innovations (штат Виргиния) для регулирования "дорожного  трафика" на орбите, который проверят в космосе для усовершенствования  его технологии.
https://youtu.be/48t0-eo55oo
https://youtu.be/48t0-eo55oo (https://youtu.be/48t0-eo55oo)
Целевая  орбита — 445 км над Землей, но в DARPA уточнили, что посчитают миссию  успешной даже при достижении спутниками высоты в 150 км.  

Ракета  

Astra Rocket 3.0 — двухступенчатая ракета-носитель легкого  класса на топливной паре "ракетный керосин/жидкий кислород" высотой 11,6  и диаметром 1,32 м. Тяга первой ступени с пятью двигателями Dеlphin —  140 кН. Вторая ступень оснащена двигателем Aether. Плановые возможности:  100 кг груза на низкую околоземную орбиту. Спроектирована под перевозку  в обычном транспортном контейнере для максимально гибкого  использования.
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/207121.jpg)  
 В космос версия Rocket 3.0 еще не летала, прошла лишь наземные  тесты. Два суборбитальных тест-запуска ракет-предшественниц завершились  неудачами: первая стартовала с Кадьяка в июле 2018-го и упала вскоре  после старта, вторая слетала примерно так же в ноябре того же года —  отказ всех пяти двигателей.  В компании подчеркнули, что возможный провал миссии их не  шокирует и перспективам не навредит, так как "исторически" для  достижения орбиты новый ракетам требуется до четырех пробных запусков.
https://youtu.be/LUW5rIYsSYk
https://youtu.be/LUW5rIYsSYk (https://youtu.be/LUW5rIYsSYk)  
--

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/68302.jpg) (https://twitter.com/planet4589) Jonathan McDowell✔@planet4589 (https://twitter.com/planet4589) 9:55 PM - Mar 1, 2020 (https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1234190446517198849)

Here is a Google Earth image of the Kodiak launch area. Where are the new LP-3A and LP-3B sites? I am guessing the sites I've called B1 and B2 here? Can someone who knows confirm or deny? @MasterActual (https://twitter.com/MasterActual) ? @johnkrausphotos (https://twitter.com/johnkrausphotos) ?

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180699.jpg)


10:14 PM - Mar 1, 2020 (https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1234195208218271744)

OK so here is my revised attempt

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180700.jpg)


(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185258.jpg) (https://twitter.com/MasterActual)  Todd Master@MasterActual (https://twitter.com/MasterActual) 10:45 PM - Mar 1, 2020 (https://twitter.com/MasterActual/status/1234203246819823618)

You have points correctly now, though the labels are wrong. The "3A?" is actually designated as "Pad C."

That was originally a gravel pad with a small concrete apron that we worked with PSCA to upgrade for #LaunchChallenge (https://twitter.com/hashtag/LaunchChallenge?src=hash) to mostly replicate their recently constructed "Pad B"


(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/68302.jpg) (https://twitter.com/planet4589) Jonathan McDowell✔@planet4589 (https://twitter.com/planet4589) 11:03 PM - Mar 1, 2020 (https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1234207737405493251)

Here is my revised attempt. Best of luck to Todd and crew for tomorrow's launch attempt.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180710.jpg)


(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/185258.jpg) (https://twitter.com/MasterActual) Todd Master@MasterActual (https://twitter.com/MasterActual) 11:44 PM - Mar 1, 2020 (https://twitter.com/MasterActual/status/1234217859208728577)

Here's a better graphic from our peeps at PSCA.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/180712.jpg)

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. написал:
Так, что там с "Астрой"-то?

Цитироватьanik написал:
 

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. (//forum/user/14022/) написал:
Так, что там с "Астрой"-то?

"Она проиграла".

Цитироватьanik написал:
 

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. (//forum/user/14022/) написал:
Так, что там с "Астрой"-то?

"Она проиграла".

ЦитироватьСтарый написал:
 

Цитироватьanik (//forum/user/13674/) написал:
 

ЦитироватьДмитрий В. (//forum/user/14022/)  написал:
Так, что там с "Астрой"-то?

"Она проиграла".

Что случилось?    

Цитировать  В случае успешного старта Astra получит от DARPA 2 млн долл. Это  позволит компании получить еще 10 млн долл. при осуществлении второго  успешного запуска, который уже запланирован на 18 марта.

ЦитироватьDARPA Launch Challenge Closes With No Winner

Final participant in original field of three qualifiers fails to launch following successful countdown procedure

OUTREACH@DARPA.MIL (mailto:OUTREACH@DARPA.MIL)
3/3/2020

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/197648.png)

Less than two years from its start, DARPA's effort to stress the approaches and processes associated with space launch ended March 2 with the lone Launch Challenge participant – Astra – scrubbing its launch with less than a minute left in the countdown before liftoff. Astra faced technical and weather-related issues during the roughly two-week window of the Challenge campaign, which ran February 17-March 2 in Kodiak, Alaska.

Meeting DARPA's timeline to demonstrate a flexible, responsive launch capability proved especially difficult. Despite time, weather, and location limitations, Astra produced a rocket and set up launch operations at Pacific Spaceport Complex - Alaska (PSC-A) after having received final target orbit information only 30 days before launch and payload upon arrival.

"In roughly two weeks, Astra moved their entire rocket and launch infrastructure from their facilities in Alameda, California, to Kodiak, Alaska, and the team set up all the equipment required to launch on a simple concrete launch pad and integrate a previously undisclosed set of payloads," said Todd Master, DARPA Launch Challenge program manager. "The preferred outcome was for us to see Astra accomplish two successful launches from two different locations within a short period of time. However, with Astra rapidly making it to launch day with minimal infrastructure and little knowledge of their launch conditions, we view the Challenge as achieving many of its goals."

Currently, space launch is a process that begins years in advance, and it relies on complex, expensive, and one-of-a-kind, fixed infrastructure. In 2018, DARPA challenged the space industry to do what no one has done before: launch payloads to orbit on extremely short notice, with no prior knowledge of the payloads, destination orbit or launch location, and do it not just once, but twice, in a matter of days from an austere launch pad.

Eighteen teams pre-qualified for the Challenge in 2018, and for the final event, three teams were selected, including Virgin Orbit, Vector Space, and Astra, which had been operating in stealth mode till February of this year. Virgin Orbit ultimately decided not to participate in the Challenge in order to focus on other commercial pursuits, and Vector ran into financial trouble late last year and closed business.

February 17, 2020, marked the opening of the first launch opportunity for the Challenge. Astra had four days for setup, and 14 days of potential launch windows to prepare, integrate, and then launch DARPA's prescribed payload to low Earth orbit. The campaign duration was allocated considering hard, yet achievable goals for flexible launch system operations and taking into account potential delays for weather and mandated crew rest. PSC-A provided two concrete pads with access to electricity and communications fiber in accordance with the Challenge guidelines. Ultimately, Astra was unable to launch within the Launch Challenge timeline, with its final attempt scrubbed due to an issue with the rocket's guidance, navigation, and control system.

"Flexible and responsive launch is critical for the Defense Department and its desire for space resilience, and the Challenge has advanced the growth of what is now a more capable launch marketplace to meet those needs than what we saw just two years ago," said Master.

# # #

ЦитироватьКонкурс DARPA завершился без победителей
2 марта аэрокосмический стартап Astra Space предпринял попытку запуска малого носителя Rocket 3.0 с космодрома на острове Кадьяк. Однако за 53 секунды до зажигания двигателя первой ступени специалисты отменили старт из-за аномальной телеметрии. Это означает, что амбициозный конкурс Управления перспективных исследовательских проектов минобороны США (DARPA) остался без победителя.

Конкурс был инициирован в 2018 г. среди компаний, занимающихся созданием малых носителей. Для победы в нем требовалось осуществить два успешных космических запуска с двух разных космодромов на территории США с разницей не более чем в 30 дней. Дополнительно задачу усложняло то, что до самого последнего момента инженерам компаний-участников не была бы известна точная масса груза, предоставляемого для запуска DARPA.

К весне 2019 г. в состязании осталось три участника: Astra Space, Vector и Virgin Orbit. В августе у Vector начались финансовые трудности, в итоге приведшие к банкротству компании. В сентябре руководство Virgin Orbit приняло решение выйти из конкурса, мотивировав это стремлением сосредоточить все усилия на доработке носителя.

После того, как число участников сократилось до одной Astra, DARPA попыталась упростить ей задачу. Было объявлено, что компания может осуществить оба запуска с одного и того же космодрома при условии, если для них будут использованы разные стартовые столы.

Изначально, Astra планировала отправить ракету в космос 21 февраля. Однако из-за ряда технических проблем дата запуска несколько раз сдвигалась и, в конечном счете, была перенесена на 2 марта, являвшееся последним днем конкурса. Если бы Astra удалось запустить первую ракету, она бы получила 2 млн долларов. В случае успешного повторного запуска до конца марта компания удостоилась бы главного приза в размере 10 млн долларов. Но в итоге, эти деньги так и остались не востребованы.

Комментируя ситуацию представители Astra заявили, что победа в конкурсе безусловно стала бы отличным подспорьем, но на данный момент главное — это успешно отправить ракету в космос. Через несколько недель компании планирует предпринять новую попытку запуска Rocket 3.0.

ЦитироватьРакеты Astra сделаны из «очень тонкого алюминия», в отличие от традиционных дорогих и трудоемких материалов, таких как углеродное волокно. Алюминий является одним из самых распространенных элементов на планете.

ЦитироватьZOOR написал:
Электрон вроде баки мотает

ЦитироватьIMAGES

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127210.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127210.jpg)
Rocket 3 Launchpad. Credits: John Kraus

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127211.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127211.jpg)
Rocket 3 Evening. Credit: John Kraus

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127208.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127208.jpg)
Rocket 3 Transport. Credit: John Kraus

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127207.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127207.jpg)
Rocket 3 Setup. Credits: John Kraus

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127209.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127209.jpg)
Rocket 3 Horizontal. Credits: John Kraus

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127213.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127213.jpg)
Engine Test. Credit: David Yoon

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127215.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127215.jpg)
Mission Control. Credit: David Yoon

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127217.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127217.jpg)
Rocket 3 Nose. Credit: John Krauss

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127218.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127218.jpg)
Rocket 3 Sunrise. Credit: John Krauss

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127219.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127219.jpg)
Rocket 3 Under Construction. Credit: David Yoon

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127220.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127220.jpg)
Rocket 3 Vertical. Credit: John Krauss

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127216.jpg) (https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127216.jpg)
Rocket 3 Mountains. Credit: John Krauss

ЦитироватьВиктор Левашов написал:
Это много или мало, интересно.

ЦитироватьВиктор Левашов написал:
2,5 млн. долл. США за 250 кг. на НОО - это получается 2500000 делим на 250 равно 10000 долл. США за килограмм.

ЦитироватьAstra readies for possible launch attempt next week
March 21, 2020 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/03/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/145957.jpg)
Astra's first satellite launcher stands on a portable launch mount at Kodiak Island, Alaska, during flight preps last month. Credit: DARPA

After missing out on an opportunity to win up to $12 million in prize money through DARPA's Launch Challenge earlier this month, Astra is gearing up for another possible orbital launch attempt next week fr om Alaska, the company's chief executive said Friday.

Chris Kemp, Astra's co-founder and CEO, said in an email Friday to Spaceflight Now that Astra is not planning to launch Monday, but the company is "working towards a possible launch attempt later in the week" from the Pacific Spaceport Complex at Kodiak Island, Alaska.

The company's first small satellite launcher was scheduled to take off during a two-week window in late February and early March in a bid to win the DARPA Launch Challenge. But schedule delays and an aborted countdown on the final day of the Launch Challenge window March 2 kept Astra from winning a $2 million prize from DARPA, which would have allowed the company to proceed to a second mission later this month with a $10 million prize attached.

Astra's launch team scrubbed the March 2 launch attempt after detecting suspect data from a sensor in the rocket's guidance, navigation and control system. At the time, Kemp said Astra could try again within weeks.

"We are focused on 'root-causing' the anomaly we saw with the sensor," Kemp said March 2. "Whether it's an issue with the actual sensor, whether it's something on the vehicle that we need to better understand, as soon as we address the issue definitively and can get a license and put the regulatory stuff in place, we'll launch again.

"That probably is not a day or two," he said March 2. "It's more like a week or two, but it's certainly not a month or two."

Airspace warning notices from the Federal Aviation Administration suggest Astra is aiming for possible launch attempts Tuesday or Wednesday. The launch window each day opens at 3:30 p.m. EDT (1930 GMT; 11:30 a.m. Alaska time) and extends for three-and-a-half hours.

Kemp said Astra is "managing" affects of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic on the company's plans.

"We are managing the impact of COVID-19 to operations, with an emphasis on safety of employees and range support staff," he said Friday in an emailed statement. "We have a very small team deployed in Alaska and are otherwise managing operations remotely."

Astra's headquarters is located in Alameda, California. On Thursday, California Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a stay-at-home order for the state's 40 million residents.

But there are exceptions "to maintain continuity of operations of ... federal critical infrastructure sectors," according to the executive order.

One of the industries exempt from the order is the "critical manufacturing sector," which includes "aerospace products and parts manufacturing," according to a Department of Homeland Security website.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/145924.jpg)
Astra employees open the payload fairing last month on the company's small satellite launcher at Kodiak Island, Alaska, to mate several small payloads ahead of the company's first orbital launch attempt. Credit: DARPA

At Astra's headquarters in California, engineers and technicians are setting up a rocket assembly line to mass-produce small satellite launchers. There is also a mission control center in Alameda, wh ere managers oversee launch countdowns. Only a handful of workers are needed to set up the rocket at the launch site.

The U.S. military, commercial customers and other clients are among Astra's potential customer base.

Astra's first orbital-class rocket — named Rocket 3, or Rocket 3.0 —  can haul around 25 pounds (55 kilograms) of payload into a polar sun-synchronous orbit, according to Astra. The specific rocket awaiting liftoff from Alaska has been designated "1 of 3."

"This was our first test launch of Rocket 3, and we called it 1 of 3 because we believed that it would probably take three launches before we could successfully deliver a satellite into Earth orbit, so we knew that this was a long shot going into it, but understood how strategically important responsive launch was to the government," Kemp said in a previous press conference.

Astra was established in 2016 and operated in stealth mode until early February, when Bloomberg published an exclusive story about the company's progress and plans.

Astra conducted two suborbital test launches from Kodiak Island in 2018.

For the DARPA Launch Challenge, Astra aimed to launch three CubeSats for the Department of Defense and the University of South Florida, plus an experimental radio beacon to help in the identification of objects in space.

DARPA officials said earlier this month the payloads would be removed from the rocket after the end of the DARPA Launch Challenge and returned to their owners. Officials have not identified what payloads will be on the next Astra launch attempt.

ЦитироватьCapabilities on the cusp: the impact of a responsive, flexible launch challenge with no winner
by Todd Master
Monday, March 23, 2020

Creating a flexible ("launch fr om anywhere") and responsive ("launch any time") space launch capability is a critical need for the Defense Department, with increasing importance as our views on national security space architectures evolve. Space resiliency is critical to our warfighting capability, and space access is its linchpin, as the means for deployment of our satellite systems. Resiliency for space access is directly created by untethering ourselves fr om one-of-a-kind fixed launch sites, which are subject to range congestion, weather, natural disasters, human-made disasters (like rockets blowing up on pads), and adversary attack. This resiliency is further bolstered by the ability to place in orbit new spacecraft at will, surging new on-orbit capability to provide tactical support to operations fr om space or rapidly replacing end-of-life, malfunctioning, or damaged spacecraft. Developing launch systems that deliver these capabilities is directly aligned with DARPA's mission of preventing strategic surprise, and led us to DARPA Launch Challenge.

At T-minus 53 seconds March 2, the Challenge ended without awarding a prize to the final competitor. The months leading to that that moment provided critical knowledge that will inform our work directly with transition partners across the Defense Department space enterprise on the near-term use of flexible and responsive space launch, a need DARPA has recognized as critical to national security in a changing space domain.

In late 2016, DARPA was closing out our Airborne Launch Assist Space Access (https://www.darpa.mil/program/airborne-launch-assist-space-access) (ALASA) program, where we sought flexible and responsive launch using a fighter jet as a staging platform. The program had encountered numerous technical problems and its scope had been reduced to what amounted to a study of propellant chemistry and characterization—short of our goals. At the same time, there was significant increase in private sector space investment and launch vehicle development. Would our organization, the Tactical Technology Office, simply give up on our goals and abandon our idea as too hard or no longer relevant? Or could we find a way to solve our problem by tapping into private sector developments and investment to achieve launch capabilities that addressed our vision for resilience?

ЦитироватьMany viable companies had no significant need for government development funding, as they already had private investments, and intended to retain all their intellectual property—often a point of contention in government-funded development. They sought government contracts, or any other form of government recognition, as it would aid them in attracting additional private funding.

At the time, there were several dozen launch vehicle developers at various stages of technical and schedule readiness. These companies were promising to develop approaches consistent with what DARPA had been after for the better part of three decades: systems that could launch on short notice from anywhere on the planet, enabled by "clean pad" designs that required minimal or easily transportable launch infrastructure, and advances in autonomous flight termination systems. It was unclear who among these companies could and would deliver (see "Responsive launch is still not quite ready for prime time" (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3897/1), The Space Review, March 9, 2020.)

After extensive conversations in 2017, and bringing together industry and forward-thinking government stakeholders to discuss how to bring our goals to fruition, common threads emerged. Many viable companies had no significant need for government development funding, as they already had private investments, and intended to retain all their intellectual property—often a point of contention in government-funded development. They sought government contracts, or any other form of government recognition, as it would aid them in attracting additional private funding. They desired access to government test facilities and ranges at government pricing.

Multiple new launch vehicle developers assured us that they would launch their first missions by mid-2019, and that they would only need one to two days from setup through launch. We digested these inputs, and created something that would be beneficial to both industry and the Defense Department.

The genesis of a prize-based challenge to demonstrate flexible and responsive space launch

The feedback from our outreach led us to the conclusion that the conditions were ripe for a DARPA Challenge (https://www.darpa.mil/work-with-us/public/prizes) to address flexible and responsive space launch. The industry already had significant investment, a broad technical base, and a myriad of significantly different approaches to solve the same problem: delivering a payload to orbit in short order with minimal infrastructure and minimal pre-launch knowledge. An adaptation of their commercial product was directly applicable to near-term military goals, and as such, the winner of such a challenge would have a major leg up in future military procurements, giving companies the upside potential that could allow them to take the financial risks needed to participate in the Challenge.

DARPA leadership approved the prize competition with two critical stipulations. One was that DARPA would have no role in safety oversight or indemnification—we would rely on existing FAA regulations and commercial insurance. The other was that it would be completed in two years from the time that it was approved in early April 2018. The first of these stipulations was put in place with consideration of some hard lessons from the DARPA's 2006 FALCON effort and work with SpaceX at Kwajalein. And with a fast turnaround, DARPA Launch Challenge now represented a new approach for space launch for the agency: a low-stakes effort that could result in a big payoff.

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Challenge ethos: be safe, be fair

We created Challenge goals to be aggressive but achievable, and most importantly, relevant to military users. Responsive space could be a tactical enabler but only useful if capabilities could be delivered within a timely fashion.

ЦитироватьWith a fast turnaround, DARPA Launch Challenge now represented a new approach for space launch for the agency: a low-stakes effort that could result in a big payoff.

We debated internally what the right metrics should be. Should we require competitors to get to T-zero in a countdown test, or actually launch to orbit? How many times? How quickly? What was relevant to real-world tactical military use? What was achievable but impactful, given the current state of the art? What were the factors beyond our control that would drive schedule? What were the regulatory requirements? Could we literally launch from anywhere, and who would be the deciding authority? We considered all of these questions in our formulation. We took lessons from prior Challenges, incorporating two overarching principles into Launch Challenge goals from the start: be safe and be fair.

The scope of most challenges at DARPA required little interagency collaboration, as they were largely self-contained. This one was going to involve multiple government regulatory agencies: the FAA, the FCC, NOAA, and a slew of different safety organizations across the Navy, the Air Force, and NASA. We were biting off a lot, but we had the benefit of DARPA's "brand" within the government on our side, and I cannot overstate the willingness of other agencies to bend and flex in order to support our mission of high-risk, high-payoff technology investment for breakthroughs in national defense.

We considered potential competitors' stated capabilities, and balanced those against what would matter to military users. We considered factors that may be beyond their control during a launch campaign (e.g. range availability, air traffic, weather) and made accommodations in the Challenge timeline to allow for those. We examined the range and spaceport required timelines for integration, statutory requirements for government agency coordination and public notifications. We developed a set of guidelines—broad strokes of metrics and execution plans—that we later refined into a specific set of rules as we learned more about the regulatory flexibility we could get, capabilities of our potential sites, and timelines and technical characteristics of our competitors. We decided to require two launches in rapid fashion from two different locations, with as minimal pre-launch knowledge of technical parameters as possible.

Creating the right prize amount was critical to the Challenge. We had budget constraints to work within, and an intention to incentivize modification of commercial products and processes for our specific use case. We did not intend to duplicate industry funding, but desired to provide a compelling enough prize to get an interesting field of competitors. Typical prize competitions are not a cost recovery mechanism for competitors, but afford winners widespread recognition as top in their field, attracting both investment and customers.

In deciding what warranted a prize, we wanted the bulk of our funding to go to something that was directly relevant to a warfighter: capability on orbit, nothing less. We ultimately decided that one launch would meet a subset of our goals, but that a second launch was really required to show the full breadth of flexibility and responsiveness. We created a discrete qualification prize of $400,000, intended to offset some of the costs of applying for an FAA launch license. The real prize purse was allocated to successful launches, with a modest prize of $2 million for Launch 1, and the maximum extent of the Defense Department prize authority of $10 million for Launch 2. Our goal was, across all prizes, to cover opportunity costs for two launches for the median pricing in our initial expected field of competitors.

For the Challenge, we intentionally chose to use the commercial regulatory process governed by the FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation, both for spaceports and launch vehicles to the maximum extent possible. In a future wh ere space launch will be used as a logistics service, the Defense Department would be best served as procuring these services on a commercial basis, rather than providing in-depth technical oversight and management of those services. When we ship packages by UPS or FedEx, we don't ask these service providers the details of their trucks and aircraft, their maintenance histories, or their parts and sparing plans—we simply pay for the delivery service to be timely and accurate and leave the rest to the shipper. That is how we would like to use space launch for on-orbit delivery.

Finally, we had to sel ect sites spanning the range of our competitors' approaches. As we had applicants considering horizontal launch systems—using an aircraft as its launch site or, for some, their first stage—we had to consider sites that could support both their approach as well as more traditional vertical launch vehicles. Within the United States, we considered all existing and projected commercial spaceports, military test ranges, and traditional space launch ranges. On the horizontal side, there were commercial spaceports in spades. On the vertical side, most were co-located on federal ranges, with the notable exception of Pacific Spaceport Complex - Alaska (aka "Kodiak"). This would ultimately have a big impact on our execution.

[свернуть]

Too many cooks in the kitchen: who decides what's safe?

We had set up a confounding problem for our competitors: they would not know which launch site they would be using until shortly before the Challenge began. This meant that they had to simultaneously obtain approvals to launch from any of our candidate sites. Our intention in setting up the Challenge was to use FAA licensing at all of our launch locations, something we had top-level agreements on from leadership at all of our sites. When those agreements were made, the sites assumed that the teams would have a few launches under their belt before the Challenge, conditions that changed through our course of execution. While true commercial FAA licensing encompasses flight and ground safety, in the cases of launch sites located on federal ranges, those ranges have responsibility and oversight for ground safety—a natural division of responsibility.

ЦитироватьUnfortunately, obtaining federal range approvals for agreed-upon waivers within the Challenge timeline became a bridge too far, primarily in consideration of the fact that we were working with never-before flown launch vehicles.

US government space launch ranges (both military and civil) have traditionally launched rockets designed with either insight or oversight of the US government as one of their customers. Bringing a new launch vehicle on to their ranges that they had never seen before, with no government personnel involved in its development, represented new territory. As such, the federal ranges struggled with constraining their role solely to ground safety, first dipping their toes, and then diving in, to flight safety elements of the vehicles. With three federal ranges from three different federal agencies (NASA, Air Force, and Navy) with three different sets of rules, this quickly emerged as a potential problem.

We brought all three agencies together, along with representatives from the FAA, to review their collective requirements and come to common agreement on how they could be met. These agencies already collaborate in the Range Commanders Council (RCC), which sets top-level guidelines for safety implementations that are then trickled down into agency-specific policies. These agencies agreed to evaluate the participating launch system at the RCC level of documentation, not the agency-specific levels. This was a great collaboration and perhaps the first time there was a direct forcing function to do so. The collective group came up with a common understanding as to what portions of their guidelines were critical, what didn't apply, and what could be waived.

Unfortunately, obtaining federal range approvals for agreed-upon waivers within the Challenge timeline became a bridge too far, primarily in consideration of the fact that we were working with never-before flown launch vehicles. As such, we effectively eliminated federal ranges from further participation in the Challenge.

We quickly looked at how we could still accomplish our goals with the remaining non-federal launch site candidate, the commercial spaceport in Kodiak. We ultimately concluded that we could stress our intended "hard problems"—short notice of payloads and orbits, minimal infrastructure, limited time to set up and launch—by using a separate launch location within the Kodiak spaceport. Moving 300 meters from our first launch location retained the same technical challenges as moving to a different launch site 5,000 kilometers away, minus a lot of planes, trains, and automobiles.

[свернуть]

The great paring down: wh ere rocket science meets timing

We started with 55 interested companies, pared back to 18 companies through our first round of information gathering, and then further narrowed to three competitors: Virgin Orbit, Vector, and Astra. All three passed Challenge qualification, satisfying DARPA that they had credible approaches that could be delivered in our timeframe and receiving license application acceptance from FAA/AST as "complete enough." Based on their projections in mid-2018, these teams all expected to be launching to orbit within the next 12 months, meaning the challenge would be right at the beginning of their commercial operations.

The Challenge timing was crucial, providing incentives right at the critical juncture of their development wh ere they could make minor course adjustments to stay both "flexible" and "responsive," before they became too entrenched in a business model that just favored one or two fixed launch locations with a large customer backlog to fulfill.

ЦитироватьWe've been asked if we would have another Launch Challenge. The answer is no, and for a good reason.

Ultimately, development timelines pushed all of our competitors' schedules to the right—not an uncommon reality in new launch vehicle development. As a result of this, by the time we got to Challenge execution, we had just one competitor remaining that was both ready and willing to launch in our timeline. Astra took a business risk, shifted their intended public engagement timeline, and opted to execute its first orbital launch attempt in the public spotlight of the DARPA Launch Challenge.

[свернуть]

BYOI (Bring-your-own-infrastructure): creating a launch site from a concrete slab in days

In Launch Challenge rules, competitors were allocated four days to set up their launch system. This meant creating and checking out both a complete launch infrastructure and vehicle. We intended this time for arriving, unpacking, checking out internal company network connectivity, and completing FAA and range-mandated rehearsals and contingency response procedures. The rules then allocated 14 days for launch attempts, which included accounting for delays for things like "red" range days due to bad weather or communications issues, mandatory crew rest requirements, and technical issues to be resolved. We made assurances to our teams that if they arrived on time, they would be guaranteed no fewer than four "green" days within the span of the campaign.

We knew our teams had initially said they needed one to two days from launch, and we wanted to afford them chances to be successful, remaining mindful that a timeline that moved from days to weeks to months would be less and less relevant to military users. Getting 14 days of air traffic closure coordination in advance was no small feat, and required a lot of negotiation with FAA. The impacts of the current way we enact closures for space launch to commercial business for both air and maritime are significant, and we flexed to the maximum extent realizable. We had some distinct advantages here at Kodiak, which had fewer air traffic routes to work around as well as the added safety benefit of sparsely populated areas around our launch corridor.

We informed our remaining competitor, Astra, that our desired launch date was February 17. This meant that they could begin setup as early as February 13, with range availability for launch four days later. Astra was completing its final testing on their first orbital vehicle, "Rocket 3.0," right up to (and through) the start of our window, ultimately shipping the vehicle by air transport on February 18. They had pre-shipped some of the ground infrastructure on February 14, and their team was busy preparing that for the rocket's arrival. Our rules did not require them to start on our start date but did not afford them extra time if they started after our initial date.

Astra worked through launch vehicle and ground system checkout, erecting the rocket on the launch site within just four days of its arrival. After pre-launch preparations (and a quick turnaround securing of the vehicle for a blizzard), on February 29 (day 13 of 14), Astra proceeded into a launch countdown, which was ultimately scrubbed due to weather conditions. March 1 was a "red" weather day, and despite having been given their allocated four "green" weather days over the course of the 14-day span, we opted to give them an additional launch opportunity on March 2. Astra successfully completed the majority of their launch countdown, and after a guidance sensor glitch at T-minus 53 seconds, they scrubbed their launch attempt for further troubleshooting.

[свернуть]

Flexibility and responsiveness on the cusp: What we did, and what we learned

Astra successfully demonstrated that they had a flexible approach to space launch that allowed them to set up and ready a liquid-fueled vehicle and its entire supporting infrastructure within a timescale of days. However, the hardest part of the Challenge was delivering to orbit—something that was not yet demonstrated.

We've been asked if we would have another Launch Challenge. The answer is no, and for a good reason. Our intention through the Challenge was to inspire developers to create flexible and responsive approaches to space launch. During Challenge execution, we saw one team, Astra, demonstrate an approach that met our intention, with a rocket that appears on the cusp of capability. We saw two other teams whose architectures were well suited for the problem, with Virgin Orbit seemingly on the verge of executing their first launch as well.

ЦитироватьWe have lots of horizontal spaceports with few vehicles in development, and one true vertical commercial spaceport with many vehicles in development.

These developments are encouraging to DARPA, and we believe we can take the combination of what we've learned on the process side and effectively combine it with these launch vehicle systems. Through our relationship with US Space Force and US Space Command, we have come to a shared vision of the importance of flexible, responsive launch, and we're working to see how we can collaborate on future demonstrations in this mission area.

This requires a great deal of further discussion, but in the interest of brevity, here's what we learned:

[/li]
• The nation needs more commercial vertical spaceports that are not co-located on federal ranges. Launch companies need the certainty provided in FAA regulations, which allows the simplest path for transportability of licenses across spaceports. Federal ranges allow for flexibility through tailoring and negotiation, but that expends valuable time and resources that drive cost and schedule. We have lots of horizontal spaceports with few vehicles in development, and one true vertical commercial spaceport with many vehicles in development.
  
• We need to establish clearer lines of responsibility on launch approvals, and eliminate redundant functions between government agencies. Federal ranges that host commercial spaceports need to accept the limits of their responsibility, and avoid conflating safety with mission assurance.
  
• We need a real-time, data-driven approach to allowing integration of launch events with air and maritime traffic. We currently create broad hazard areas that impact airlines and maritime cargo and fishing operations for extended periods of time without regard to actual liftoff times or launch events, resulting in tangible financial impacts. These have been manageable with our current infrequent space launch cadence, but that time is rapidly coming to an end. These impacts can be reduced significantly with real-time data integration from spaceports and launch systems.
  
• We need further investments in autonomous flight termination approaches and space-based telemetry systems. Traditional approaches in widespread use today tether us to ranges and require time and resources to integrate, limiting both flexibility and responsiveness. Autonomous termination systems have been proven on a limited number of launch vehicles, but they must become the norm, not the exception. Space-based telemetry would allow further reduction in range requirements, promoting the ability to launch fr om truly anywhere and maintain situational awareness throughout flight.
  
• We need further investment and process changes in rapid mission planning. Current timelines for trajectory and dispersion analyses to be completed and reviewed are on the timescale of several days to weeks. These timelines will not support true responsive needs.
  
• We must consider how we can build satellites to favor robustness and ease of launch integration instead of dedicating every kilogram to maximizing performance. We used cubesat-class spacecraft on Launch Challenge, which did not require unique coupled loads analyses. This was a big enabler of our timeline and flexibility. Had we used larger, more complex spacecraft, the processes and timelines for coupled loads analyses would have quickly negated all of our plans. Shifting approaches on this will require new design ideas and a recognition that speed of launch integration to enable fast delivery to orbit is a unique and necessary quality.
  

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The Launch Challenge provided critical information that allows DARPA to proceed with future programs based on knowledge of what is working within the space domain, level-setting industry's abilities, and what we need to focus on next. We will work directly with our transition partners across the Defense Department space enterprise to understand the results that we achieved, and drive the nation to make near-term use of flexible and responsive space launch to retain and expand America's military leadership in space.

●

Todd Master is the DARPA Launch Challenge program manager in DARPA's Tactical Technology Office.

ЦитироватьThe Pacific Spaceport Complex reported an "anomaly" on a launch pad during a rocket launch dress rehearsal on Monday. The anomaly did not result in any injuries, according to Alaska Aerospace CEO Mark Lester.


Reached shortly after the incident, Lester said "I can confirm we had an anomaly on the launch pad. We are executing our emergency checklist. We request everyone stay clear of the area to allow our crew to address the situation."


No details have been released yet as far as what caused the anomaly. Lester said Astra's launch, previously scheduled for Tuesday, has been cancelled.


At 5 p.m. Lester said the emergency response had concluded. "The area is still hazardous and should be avoided. There will be personnel on site overnight to monitor," he said.


California-based rocket startup Astra had scheduled its rocket "One of Three" to launch from the Narrow Cape spaceport this week. Astra has not yet responded to a request for comment.


This is a developing story. KMXT will have more details as they become available.

ЦитироватьAstra rocket damaged in pre-launch tests
by Jeff Foust (https://spacenews.com/author/jeff-foust/) — March 24, 2020

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/191666.jpg)
Astra's Rocket 3.0 undergoing prelaunch checks during an earlier launch attempt at Pacific Spaceport Complex - Alaska. Credit: John Kraus/Astra

WASHINGTON — Small launch vehicle startup Astra has postponed its next launch attempt after the rocket was damaged in what local officials say was an "anomaly" during a prelaunch test.

Astra had been preparing for a launch of its "Rocket 3.0" vehicle as soon as March 24 from Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska. A previous launch attempt March 2, part of the now-completed DARPA Launch Challenge, was scrubbed less than a minute before liftoff after sensors reported anomalous data.

However, notices to airmen, or NOTAMs, posted by the Federal Aviation Administration restricting airspace around and downrange from the launch site for launch attempts March 24 and 25 were taken down late March 23.

In an email late March 23, Chris Kemp, chief executive of Astra, said the rocket had been damaged in prelaunch testing earlier in the day. "We'll be rescheduling launch," he said, but had not selected a new launch date. He did not elaborate on the damage the rocket sustained.

Local radio station KMXT reported March 23 that there had been an "anomaly" at the launch site on Kodiak Island that prompted an emergency response. There were no injuries reported, but the area was cordoned off.

"The area is still hazardous and should be avoided. There will be personnel on site overnight to monitor," Mark Lester, chief executive of Alaska Aerospace, which operates the spaceport, told KMXT after the emergency response concluded.

Astra has publicly not disclosed details about the prelaunch anomaly or even that it was planning another launch. The company has gone quiet since it scrubbed its last launch attempt March 2 at the end of the DARPA Launch Challenge. Kemp said at a post-scrub media teleconference that he expected it would be "a week or two" before the company would be ready to make another launch attempt.

The company called this particular vehicle "1 of 3" as it was the first of three similar vehicles in production. In an interview in February, Kemp said the second vehicle was 90% complete and the third 40% complete. "It's not our expectation that our first launch will succeed, but it is our expectation that a campaign will succeed if we launch, learn and iterate," Kemp said in that earlier interview.

Travel restrictions linked to the coronavirus pandemic could delay any future launch attempts, particularly if those attempts require Astra to bring new personnel to the launch site. Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy announced March 23 that all people arriving in the state, be they from other parts of the United States or from other nations, must self-quarantine for 14 days after arrival.

ЦитироватьAstra suffers "anomaly" during pre-launch test in Alaska
March 24, 2020 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/03/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/145956.jpg)
File photo of Astra's first orbital-class small satellite launcher during pre-flight testing last month at the Pacific Spaceport Complex at Kodiak Island, Alaska. Credit: DARPA

A small satellite launcher built by Astra "experienced an anomaly" Monday on a launch pad at Kodiak Island, Alaska, forcing the cancellation of a planned orbital launch attempt this week, according to the company's co-founder and CEO.

The incident at the Pacific Spaceport Complex on Kodiak Island occurred during a pre-launch countdown dress rehearsal, and was first reported by KMXT, a local public radio station.

"I can confirm that the vehicle experienced an anomaly after an otherwise very successful day of testing in preparation for the launch," said Chris Kemp, Astra's co-founder and CEO, in an emailed statement late Monday.

Officials from Astra and the Pacific Spaceport Complex, which is run by the Alaska Aerospace Corp., said no one was injured during the mishap. Astra's rocket was damaged, although the extent of the damage was unclear.

"Fortunately, our hardware was the only thing harmed, and the team is already working hard to understand the root cause so we can improve the design," Kemp said.

Astra was planning a launch attempt was soon as Tuesday to place a small payload into low Earth orbit. Astra's first orbital launcher, named Rocket 3 or Rocket 3.0, is designed to carry up to 55 pounds (25 kilograms) of payload into a sun-synchronous polar orbit.

Those plans were canceled after Monday's anomaly, Kemp said.

"Unfortunately, we will not be attempting a launch this week," he said. "We intend to wait until conditions with coronavirus improve before making another attempt."

"I can confirm we had an anomaly on the launch pad," said Mark Lester, CEO of Alaska Aerospace Corp., an agency of the state of Alaska. "We are executing our emergency checklist. We request everyone stay clear of the area to allow our crew to address the situation," he told KMXT (https://kmxt.org/2020/03/anomaly-at-pacific-spaceport-complex-launch-rehearsal-no-injuries-as-a-result/).

Astra's rocket was originally supposed to launch in February as part of a prize competition managed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, a U.S. military research and development office.

DARPA's Launch Challenge offered up to $12 million prize money to a company that demonstrated its ability to launch a small payload to low Earth orbit on short notice, then perform the same feat from a different launch pad less than a month later.

The deadline for the first of two Astra missions under DARPA's Launch Challenge was March 2. After several weather delays and other schedule slips in previous days, Astra scrubbed a launch attempt March 2 due to suspect data detected from the rocket's guidance, navigation and control system.

Three CubeSats for the U.S. Department of Defense and the University of South Florida, along with a space-based beacon designed to aid in space traffic management, were slated to ride Astra's rocket into orbit through DARPA's Launch Challenge.

On March 2, DARPA and Astra officials said the Prometheus CubeSat, the University of South Florida's two Articulated Reconnaissance and Communications Expedition, or ARCE, nano satellites, and the space-based radio beacon payload were to be removed from the rocket after the end of the Launch Challenge.

Jared Adams, a DARPA spokesperson, said those payloads were safely removed from the rocket before Monday's anomaly.

Kemp confirmed no payloads were on-board Astra's rocket at the time of the incident Monday.

Astra says its rockets can launch with a small crew, requiring just days to set up a portable launch pad. The rocket itself, which measures 38 feet (11.6 meters) long, can fit into a standard shipping container and be towed by truck.

The rocket is powered by five kerosene-fueled on its first stage, and a single kerosene-fed engine on its second stage.

Astra designated the rocket "1 of 3."

"This was our first test launch of Rocket 3, and we called it 1 of 3 because we believed that it would probably take three launches before we could successfully deliver a satellite into Earth orbit, so we knew that this was a long shot going into it, but understood how strategically important responsive launch was to the government," Kemp said in a March 2 teleconference with reporters.

Headquartered in Alameda, California, Astra was established in 2016 and operated in stealth mode until early February, when Bloomberg published an exclusive story about the company's progress and plans.

Astra is one of many companies vying for a place in the commercial small satellite launch market. It's just the second company of the group to get an orbital-class rocket to a launch pad, following Rocket Lab's debut in 2018.

ЦитироватьRocket startup Astra trims staff to survive pandemic until next year
PUBLISHED SUN, APR 5 202010:24 AM EDT

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/140948.jpg) Michael Sheetz (https://www.cnbc.com/michael-sheetz/)@THESHEETZTWEETZ (https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz)

KEY POINTS

[/li]
• San Francisco-area rocket builder Astra cut its overall headcount to about 120 employees from about 150, a person familiar told CNBC.
  
  
  
• Given Astra's financial position, the person said the company's leadership expects it has enough cash to last until the first quarter of next year.
  
  
  
• The company also recently lost one of its rockets in a fire during testing, the person said, with Astra not expecting to attempt another launch for a few months.
  

[/SIZE]
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/48027.jpg)
Astra tests a rocket at its headquarters on the San Francisco Bay in Alameda, California.
Astra

Rocket builder Astra, a San Francisco-area startup, recently reduced its staff through a mix of furloughs and layoffs in order to survive delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, a person familiar with the situation told CNBC.

Astra cut its overall headcount to about 120 employees from about 150 last month, the person said. The majority of the dismissed workers were furloughed for three months, with only a handful laid off permanently.

Given Astra's financial position – it has customer contracts for a few dozen launches and had raised about $100 million from investors including ACME Capital, Airbus Ventures, Canaan Partners and Marc Benioff – the person said that the company's leadership expects it has enough cash to last until the first quarter of next year.

Astra was previously hoping to close a new round of funding in the next few months. But investors across the U.S. have frozen new deals, instead focusing on helping existing portfolio companies survive.

The person added that Astra is making no assumptions about its existing launch agreements, with its financial estimates removing all revenue that wasn't coming from contracts it deemed solid. Astra's customers are worried about surviving this crisis themselves, the person said, with about half of its customers looking to pull out or at the very least renegotiate.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/48029.jpg)
Inside Astra's rocket production facility in Alameda, California.
Astra

Astra is continuing to operate. However, the person told CNBC that only about 15% of its employees were daily working at its facilities last month, as the company took precautionary steps to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

Astra is one of many in the space industry deemed "mission essential" by the Pentagon, with a letter that allows companies working national security contracts to continue operations even if state governments enforce lockdowns or shelter-in-place orders.

Setback in Alaska

The company was preparing for its third orbital launch attempt late last month, with Astra getting its Rocket 3.0 ready on a launchpad in Kodiak, Alaska. But there was an anomaly during a prelaunch test, local officials said (https://kmxt.org/2020/03/anomaly-at-pacific-spaceport-complex-launch-rehearsal-no-injuries-as-a-result/). While no one was hurt, a person familiar told CNBC that a fire consumed Astra's rocket – a total loss.

Astra is still investigating the mishap, which the person said appears to have been an unfortunate mistake. Because Astra needed to have a second rocket ready for the DARPA Launch Challenge, the person said the company plans to take another rocket up to Alaska in a few months.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/140952.jpg)
An Astra rocket on the launchpad in Kodiak, Alaska.
Astra | John Kraus

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67716.png) Astra @Astra 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1272865773204066306)

Despite COVID-19, damage to our launch system, and on-going events affecting our country, the team has been impressively resilient and we've confirmed a launch window beginning July 20th out of Kodiak, Alaska!

Цитата: undefinedRocket startup Astra trying for an orbital launch again in July, renewing fundraising efforts
PUBLISHED TUE, JUN 16 2020 12:32 PM EDT
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/140948.jpg) Michael Sheetz (https://www.cnbc.com/michael-sheetz/) @THESHEETZTWEETZ (https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz)

---

KEY POINTS

• Rocket builder Astra will try again for an orbital launch as early as July 20, as the venture capital-backed startup looks to crack into the business of launching small satellites.
  
  
• The company has raised about $100 million to date, from investors including Advance, ACME Capital, Airbus Ventures, Canaan Partners and Salesforce founder Marc Benioff.
  
  
• Astra CEO Chris Kemp told CNBC that that he will restart the company's fundraising in the next month as well, which he says is "a function of the market recovering" for now.
  

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/48026.jpg)
An Astra rocket standing on the launchpad in Kodiak, Alaska.
Astra / John Kraus

Rocket builder Astra will try again for its first orbital rocket launch in July, as the San Francisco-area startup navigates the coronavirus pandemic environment while trying to begin flying satellites to space regularly.

The company suffered a setback in March when a fire broke out as Astra was getting its Rocket 3.0 ready on the launchpad. But the company diagnosed that issue and will ship a new rocket up to Alaska at the end of this month, for a launch window that opens on July 20. Astra is aiming for orbit with this launch, although CEO Chris Kemp explained to CNBC on Monday that he defines success as a stable flight for the first part of the launch.

"Our strategy here is to see the first stage perform, and then we have two more flights," Kemp said. "We still intend to iterate towards orbit."

His company's rocket stands about 40 feet tall and falls in the category of small launch vehicles. These small rockets have become more popular due to an increase in the number of small satellites and spacecraft, often the size of a mailbox or washing machine, looking for rides to orbit. Currently the small rocket business is dominated by Rocket Lab (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/03/rocket-lab-ceo-space-industry-in-coronavirus-slog.html), which has launched 12 missions to orbit successfully.

Astra has raised about $100 million to date, from investors including Advance (the investment arm of the family of the late billionaire S.I. Newhouse), ACME Capital, Airbus Ventures, Canaan Partners and Salesforce (https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=CRM) founder Marc Benioff (https://www.cnbc.com/marc-benioff/). Astra's board includes Advance senior executive Nomi Bergman and ACME Capital partner Scott Stanford.

While Astra has enough cash on hand to get to early 2021, Kemp said that he's "going to be restarting that fundraising process" in the next month. Astra previously planned to raise new capital in the second quarter but that changed when the pandemic hit.

"That is a function of the market recovering, at least for now," Kemp said. "I think our calculus has now shifted a little bit, because there's been a lot of inbound interest about investing in the company right now."

Astra trimmed its staff (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/05/rocket-startup-astra-trims-staff-to-survive-pandemic-until-next-year.html) through a mix of furloughs and layoffs when the coronavirus pandemic began, but Kemp said that the company's been able to bring back 10 of those who were furloughed. The company now has a total of 119 employees, including eight who remain furloughed.

"We brought those folks back because they accelerated our ability to deliver another launch in July," Kemp said.

Next week Astra plans to do a test of its Rocket 3.1 at the company's headquarters in Alameda, California. Known as a "hot fire," Kemp said the test will see Astra fire up the rocket's engines for 10 seconds.

"Then we pack it up and ship it up to Alaska," Kemp said.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/48027.jpg)
Astra tests a rocket at its headquarters on the San Francisco Bay in Alameda, California.
Astra

Kemp went into more detail about the company's March anomaly, which destroyed its Rocket 3.0 during launch preparations. He said that, "after a really successful rehearsal," a valve on the rocket stuck open while Astra was letting the fuel out of the rocket.

"It occurred during a phase of the tanking process where the relief valve couldn't relieve the pressure fast enough," Kemp said.

The valve is a piece Astra had built in-house and tested "thousands of times successfully," Kemp noted. It took several months of Astra trying to reproduce the failure before the company found the root cause. In the process of doing that, Astra also put in three levels of redundancy so it won't happen again.

"So it's kind of like a big pause button was pressed, and then we're hitting play again," Kemp said.

Demand for launch during the crisis

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/48028.jpg)
Astra's rocket 3.0 during launch preparations in Kodiak, Alaska.
Astra / John Kraus

Astra is one of many companies in the space industry deemed "mission essential" by the Pentagon when the coronavirus crisis began. After nearly a decade of private capital flowing into young and growing space companies, analysts say the pandemic froze funding (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/22/space-sectors-most-at-risk-from-coronavirus-freeze-in-vc-funding.html) and some executives described a "slog" ahead for the industry. (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/03/rocket-lab-ceo-space-industry-in-coronavirus-slog.html) Kemp agreed that COVID-19 has had an impact, saying that "it's made a lot of things a little harder" and created friction in his company's development.

"Things don't become impossible. Things take a little bit more time," Kemp said.

Only about 15% of Astra's employees were coming into its facilities daily in March, but that number has gone back up to 90% now, Kemp noted. A big part of Astra's push to get back to the launchpad is that the company has a huge backlog of customers that are waiting to fly various payloads," Kemp said. He added that the company has not "lost a single customer" during the crisis and has actually "increased the number of things that we'll be flying for them in every case."

"I think that speaks to the demand that's out there and the lack of supply," Kemp said.

A single customer can buy a dedicated Astra launch for about $2.5 million. That makes its rockets competitive against other companies offering small rocket rides to space, as Rocket Lab's larger Electron goes for about $7 million.

Astra's strategy

Kemp emphasized that Astra remains focused on scaling its product. Its first step is getting to orbit within the next three launches. But after that, Kemp says Astra will be able ramp up its production due to the simplicity of its rockets. Astra's production doesn't use carbon fiber or 3D printing, which Kemp described as "high cost manufacturing" processes and "terrible ways to make anything at scale." Astra has brought 95% of its supply chain in-house, which Kemp said means "we literally take raw materials in one loading dock and send rockets out the other."

"It's designed so that we can do thousands of launches a year ultimately," Kemp said. "Our strategy remains: Simplify everything as much as possible, automate everything as much as possible and focus on scale."

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/48029.jpg)
Inside Astra's rocket production facility in Alameda, California.
Astra

Despite the company's vertical integration, the COVID-19 environment has meant Astra has had to dial back its aggressive approach. It's spread out its launch schedule, going from a launch "every month or two" to one launch per quarter.

"We'll learn what we can from it and then the quarter later we'll come out and we'll fly again," Kemp said. "You want to keep the cost of failure low and keep the velocity of learning high."

Astra has several rockets being assembled currently, with Rocket 3.2 nearly finished and Rocket 3.3 close behind it. But Astra was incorporated less than four years ago in October 2016, making Kemp feel like he has some breathing room to get to orbit. He compared Astra's progress to that of SpaceX and Rocket Lab, as those companies reached orbit 6 years and 12 years, respectively, after being founded.

"We've been at this for three and a half years. So that's five times faster than Rocket Lab and three times faster than SpaceX," Kemp said. "Let's integrate, test, learn and repeat."

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67716.png) Astra @Astra 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1283808474313265158)

Volume up!
https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1283802780155539457/pu/vid/1280x720/lMsMOhnUI-SrjLNs.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1283802780155539457/pu/vid/1280x720/lMsMOhnUI-SrjLNs.mp4) (0:17)

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67716.png) Astra @Astra 1 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1283808475663892482)

Say hello to Rocket 3.1, our orbital launch vehicle that just passed its 2nd static hotfire test with flying colors. Having completed testing, Rocket 3.1 is now packed up and on its way to Kodiak, Alaska for our first orbital launch attempt!


1 ч (https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1283808476272029697)

We are narrowing and finalizing our launch window - we'll be announcing that window early next week!

Цитата: undefined(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67716.png) Astra @Astra 23 мин. назад (https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1285269482479300608)

Our incredible team got together for one last photo with Rocket 3.1 before it headed up to Kodiak last week!

We're excited to announce that our 6-day launch window starts on August 2nd and is open from 12:30-4pm PT each day!

#sendit (https://twitter.com/hashtag/sendit?src=hashtag_click)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/50823.jpg)

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.07.2020 22:30:39И всё-таки: зачем ей гранёный ГО? :o

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.07.2020 22:30:39И всё-таки: зачем ей гранёный ГО? :o

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.07.2020 22:30:39И всё-таки: зачем ей гранёный ГО? :o

Цитата: vissarion от 22.07.2020 19:36:03

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.07.2020 22:30:39И всё-таки: зачем ей гранёный ГО? :o

У Astra идеология - максимальная роботизация изготовления, возможно гранёный технологически легче делать автоматами ?

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 22.07.2020 19:38:54

Цитата: vissarion от 22.07.2020 19:36:03

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.07.2020 22:30:39И всё-таки: зачем ей гранёный ГО? :o

У Astra идеология - максимальная роботизация изготовления, возможно гранёный технологически легче делать автоматами ?

А обечайки баков почему циилиндрические?

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 19:53:57Потому что цилиндр лучше держит давление чем "карандаш". Не?😉

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 22.07.2020 19:59:52

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 19:53:57Потому что цилиндр лучше держит давление чем "карандаш". Не?😉

ГО тоже должен держать избыточное давление - только не внутреннее, а внешнее. А потом, кстати, и внутреннее тоже - после выхода из плотных слоёв атмосферы.

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 20:07:50

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 22.07.2020 19:59:52

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 19:53:57Потому что цилиндр лучше держит давление чем "карандаш". Не?😉

ГО тоже должен держать избыточное давление - только не внутреннее, а внешнее. А потом, кстати, и внутреннее тоже - после выхода из плотных слоёв атмосферы.

Ну, весь вопрос в величинах давлений.
Опять же гранёный может быть технологичнее, а значит дешевле.
По некоторым, смутно припоминаемым, данным граненые формы лучше обтекаются на гиперзвуковых скоростях. Может ещё и в этом дело🙄
ИМХУ

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 22.07.2020 20:11:55

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 20:07:50

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 22.07.2020 19:59:52

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 19:53:57Потому что цилиндр лучше держит давление чем "карандаш". Не?😉

ГО тоже должен держать избыточное давление - только не внутреннее, а внешнее. А потом, кстати, и внутреннее тоже - после выхода из плотных слоёв атмосферы.

Ну, весь вопрос в величинах давлений.
Опять же гранёный может быть технологичнее, а значит дешевле.
По некоторым, смутно припоминаемым, данным граненые формы лучше обтекаются на гиперзвуковых скоростях. Может ещё и в этом дело🙄
ИМХУ

Каким образом он может быть технологичнее? За счёт чего? Как может быть технологичнее гранёное изделие, сопрягаемое с цилиндром, по сравнению с изделием круглого сечения?

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 22.07.2020 20:11:55

Цитата: telekast от 22.07.2020 20:07:50Ну, весь вопрос в величинах давлений.
Опять же гранёный может быть технологичнее, а значит дешевле.
По некоторым, смутно припоминаемым, данным граненые формы лучше обтекаются на гиперзвуковых скоростях. Может ещё и в этом дело🙄
ИМХУ

Каким образом он может быть технологичнее? За счёт чего? Как может быть технологичнее гранёное изделие, сопрягаемое с цилиндром, по сравнению с изделием круглого сечения?

ЦитироватьAstra запланировала на август следующую попытку орбитального пуска
Оператор пусковых услуг Astra space объявил о том, что он планирует в начале августа попробовать еще раз запустить с острова Кодияк свое легкое средство выведения. Предыдущая неудачная попытка произошла пять месяцев назад. Запускаемая ракета обозначена как Rocket 3.1, а окно для ее пуска определено промежутком между вторым и седьмым августом. Ранее компания планировала эту операцию в период с 20 по 27 июля и до сих пор не обнародовала данные о причинах переноса. Ожидается, что предстоящий пуск станет одним из трех, которые Astra наметила к реализации перед выходом со своей ракетой на рынок легких средств выведения, пишет Ecoruspace.
А.Ж.

ЦитироватьAstra ships next small satellite launcher to Alaska spaceport
July 23, 2020 (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/07/) | Stephen Clark (https://spaceflightnow.com/author/stephen-clark/)

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/31469.jpg)
Astra's second orbital-class small satellite launcher undergoes a hotfire test before its shipment to Alaska for final launch preparations. Credit: Astra

Astra's next small satellite launcher has shipped to Kodiak Island in Alaska for final preparations ahead of a test flight planned in early August, five months after the company's first orbital rocket faltered before getting off the ground.

The small launch company, headquartered in Alameda, California, announced Monday that the mission's six-day launch window opens Aug. 2. Astra will have a launch opportunity between 3:30 p.m. and 7 p.m. EDT (1930 and 2300 GMT) each day.

The new two-stage launch vehicle, which the company calls Rocket 3.1, will take off from the Pacific Spaceport Complex on Kodiak Island. While the liquid-fueled rocket is designed to reach orbit, Astra says it will consider the test flight a success even it doesn't enter orbit.

"Success for this flight means we accomplish enough to make orbit within three flights, which we have defined as at least achieving a nominal first stage burn," Astra said in June.

Chris Kemp, Astra's co-founder and CEO, said the company will not be providing a live video stream of the launch to the public, but will release video imagery of the flight after it occurs.

"We do not yet employ production, marketing, or communications folks, so our ability to produce a public webcast is limited," Kemp said in response to questions from Spaceflight Now. "We are focusing all resources on engineering so that we can reach orbit in the next couple of flights."

The design of Rocket 3.1 is based on a launch vehicle Astra sent to Kodiak earlier this year for a launch campaign that was part of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's Launch Challenge. The DARPA Launch Challenge, managed by the Pentagon's research and development agency, was conceived to incentivize development of new responsive commercial U.S. launch systems.

DARPA offered up to $12 million prize money to a company that demonstrated its ability to launch a small payload to low Earth orbit on short notice, then perform the same feat from a different launch pad less than a month later.

The deadline for the first of two Astra missions under DARPA's Launch Challenge was March 2. After several weather delays and other schedule slips in late February, Astra fueled its Rocket 3.0 vehicle on an austere launch pad at Kodiak on the final day of the challenge March 2.

But Astra scrubbed a launch attempt (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/03/03/after-last-minute-abort-darpa-launch-challenge-ends-without-a-winner/) due to suspect data detected from the rocket's guidance, navigation and control system.

The March 2 launch attempt was streamed live on Internet, but that production was managed by DARPA, not Astra.

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/31470.jpg)
Astra team members pose with the company's next small satellite launch vehicle before shipment from California to Alaska. Credit: Astra

Astra was set to try again to launch Rocket 3.0 from Kodiak later in March outside the realm of the DARPA Launch Challenge, but the vehicle "experienced an anomaly (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/03/24/astra-suffers-anomaly-during-pre-launch-test-in-alaska/)" during pre-flight testing on the launch pad, Kemp said at the time.

Satellite imagery of the launch facility on Kodiak Island showed burn scars, suggesting the rocket may have exploded or caught fire. Kemp said no payloads were on-board the rocket during the accident.

Founded in 2016, Astra operated in stealth mode until earlier this year.

The company says its rockets can launch with a small crew, requiring just days to set up a portable launch pad.

The rocket itself, which measures 38 feet (11.6 meters) long, can fit into a standard shipping container and be towed by truck. Earlier this year, Astra officials said the Rocket 3.0 vehicle was designed to carry up to 55 pounds (25 kilograms) of payload into a sun-synchronous polar orbit — enough to loft a cluster of tiny nanosatellites for the U.S. military, NASA, or commercial customers.

Astra says it is building up a capability to mass-produce rockets that can be shipped to launch sites anywhere in the world, along with the company's own mobile launch pad and ground support equipment. In the DARPA Launch Challenge earlier this year, Astra proved it could set up its launch infrastructure on a bare launch pad in a matter of a couple of weeks.

"Rapid test and iteration are the cornerstones of our development process," Astra says on its website. "We've performed thousands of rocket engine tests at our headquarters in Alameda, a few hundred feet away from where those engines are designed and built. We can afford to experiment quickly and repeatedly because our rockets are far less expensive. The rockets are primarily constructed from lightweight aluminum, instead of costly composite and 3D printed materials.

Last month, the U.S. Defense Department announced intentions (https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/06/19/u-s-military-to-award-smallsat-launch-contracts-using-covid-19-relief-funds/) to award small satellite launch contracts to six companies, including Astra, using funds appropriated to help stabilize the defense industrial base amid the coronavirus pandemic.

But the military withdrew the procurement notice July 1 after shifting the funding toward small business loans, Space News reported (https://spacenews.com/funds-no-longer-available-for-defense-production-act-small-launch-contracts/) earlier this month.

Цитировать

WE HAVE LIFTOFF!

SEPTEMBER 12, 2020

At 8:19pm PT, Rocket 3.1 left the Alaskan coast at Astra's Kodiak launch site. We're excited to have our first orbital attempt under our belt!

As we've always said, we expect it to take three flights to make it to orbit. Tonight, we saw a beautiful launch! Preliminary data review indicates the rocket performed very well. Early in the flight, our guidance system appears to have introduced some slight oscillation into the flight, causing the vehicle to drift from its planned trajectory leading to a commanded shutdown of the engines by the flight safety system. We didn't meet all of our objectives, but we did gain valuable experience, plus even more valuable flight data. This launch sets us well on our way to reaching orbit within two additional flights, so we're happy with the result.

We are incredibly proud of what the team accomplished today. This was our first orbital launch attempt, and the first flight of a rocket designed from the ground-up for low cost mass production and highly-automated launch operations. The entire launch system was deployed by six people in less than a week – completely unprecedented.

Astra's strategy is to learn fast through iterative development. Although we're pleased with today's outcome, we still have more work to do to reach orbit. Once we reach orbit, we will relentlessly continue to improve the economics of the system as we deliver our customers' payloads.

Over the next several weeks, we'll be taking a close look at the flight data to determine how to make the next flight more successful. Rocket 3.2 is already built and ready for another big step towards orbit. Thank you to our incredible team and their families, all of our supporters, and stay tuned for updates over the next few weeks. We'll be back to the pad before you know it!

Chris and Adam

(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/127221.jpg)

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 12.09.2020 14:20:53Пожелаем им удачи!

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67521.jpg) Stephen Clark @StephenClark1 12 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/1304852209860042753)

In a virtual press briefing, Astra officials say the guidance system issue that introduced a roll oscillation on the Rocket 3.1 flight last night will likely be fixable with a software update.

Astra says the next launch with Rocket 3.2 is likely before the end of the year.

Цитировать(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/67716.png) Astra @Astra 2 ч. назад (https://twitter.com/Astra/status/1331658996525064199)

Things are heating up! Here's a look at Rocket 3.2's final static fire test ahead of our December 7th launch.
 
Rocket 3.2 is powered by five Delphin electric-pump-fed engines. Made in-house, each engine produces over 6,500 lbs. of thrust.

https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1331658962857385984/pu/vid/1280x720/p3MY9nUdkorF-wO3.mp4 (https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1331658962857385984/pu/vid/1280x720/p3MY9nUdkorF-wO3.mp4) (0:14)

ЦитироватьAstra предпримет вторую попытку орбитального запуска своей ракеты
Компания Astra, разрабатывающая ракеты лёгкого класса, сделает вторую попытку орбитального запуска в декабре, три месяца спустя после потери предыдущей ракеты.
19 ноября компания анонсировала завершение испытаний ракеты, известной как Rocket 3.2, она была доставлена на стартовую площадку Pacific Spaceport Complex на острове Кадьяк на Аляске, где было произведено её статическое огневое испытание [смотрите видео].
12-дневное окно для запуска открывается 7 декабря в 22:00 МСК и закроется в 1:00 МСК 8 декабря.
Второй запуск должен продемонстрировать, что компания способна достичь орбиты. Первая попытка орбитального запуска, Rocket 3.1 11 сентября, закончилась отключением двигателей спустя 30 секунд после запуска, что привело к падению ракеты недалеко от места старта и взрыву.
В своём блоге Astra сказали, что система управления «по-видимому создала лёгкие колебания, что привело к отклонению от траектории и автоматическому отключению двигателей».
«Мы не достигли всех поставленных нами целей, но получили ценный опыт и куда более ценные данные о полёте», - написали Astra в блоге. «Этот пуск приближает нас к успеху на пути к орбите, и в этом смысле мы довольны результатом».
Ещё до первой попытки запуска, в Astra сказали, что они не ожидают достижения орбиты во время первого или второго запуска. Но компания ожидала достигнуть важных для неё этапов – номинальная работа двигателей и правильного разделения ступеней, однако эти цели не были достигнуты.
Миссия Rocket 3.1 была первой попыткой компании осуществить орбитальный запуск, но первый раз компания пыталась осуществить пуск своей ракеты ещё во время участия в конкурсе DARPA Launch Challenge. Astra отменила запуск менее чем за минуту до старта в последний день конкурса, не получив приз в $2 млн, если бы их ракета успешно стартовала и достигла орбиты.
Вторая попытка осуществить старт Rocket 3.0 была предпринята в конце марта. Однако топливный клапан вышел из строя во время заправки. Это привело к «избыточному давлению в баке, в конечном итоге, к потере ракеты.
Неизвестно, будет ли ракета во время новой попытки нести полезную нагрузку. Rocket 3.1 летала без неё, по решению Адама Лондона (Adam London), со-основатель Astra. «Мы не хотим без надобности подвергать полезную нагрузку риску».
Так или иначе, пожелаем успешного запуска компании Astra и их ракете 3.2

ЦитироватьКомпания Astra вскоре станет первой космической компанией, торгующейся на Nasdaq

Вот что об этом написал Крис Кэмп, CEO компании Astra:

"Космос всегда пленял нас, потому что он представляет собой рубеж, который просто недосягаем, и будущее, которое ещё предстоит написать. Когда я служил директором по технологиям в NASA, я был частью команды выдающихся новаторов, которые верили, что космос скоро станет осязаемой и полезной частью нашей повседневной жизни. Мы создали компанию Astra, чтобы развить это видение и сделать космос следующей границей для человеческих инноваций.
Сегодня мы не могли не радоваться тому, что объявили о следующем: скоро Astra станет компанией, торгующей на рынке Nasdaq.
Мы выходим на рынок с чрезвычайно сильным финансовым положением. Мы привлекли более $500 млн от частных инвесторов, и у нас уже есть более 50 запусков в нашем манифесте. Только в прошлом году мы начали производство и запуск ракет и запустили наш первый космодром на Кадьяке (Аляска). Первую попытку запуска на орбиту мы осуществили с помощью Rocket 3.1 в сентябре, а через три месяца стали самой быстрорастущей частной компанией в истории США, которая вышла в космос и продемонстрировала пусковую систему, способную выводить спутники на низкие околоземные орбиты.
Мы только начали. Этим летом мы доставим нашу первую коммерческую полезную нагрузку, а позже в этом году начнём ежемесячные запуски, и в течение следующих 2-3 лет мы резко увеличим график наших запусков с целью ежедневных запусков к 2025 году.
Но речь идёт не о ближайших 2-3 годах, а о следующем столетии. Начиная с того, что мы сделаем отправку полезной нагрузки в космос быстрее, проще и менее капиталоёмкой, мы строим платформу космических сервисов, которая будет катализировать волну инноваций, которые принесут пользу нашей планете так, как это невообразимо сегодня.
Это путешествие всей жизни, и мы не можем не радоваться тому, что будет дальше".

ЦитироватьNASA Awards Launch Service Contract for TROPICS Mission to Study Storm Processes
NASA has selected Astra Space Inc. to provide a launch service for the agency's Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation Structure and Storm Intensity with a Constellation of SmallSats (TROPICS) mission. The TROPICS mission consists of a constellation of six CubeSats and will increase the scientific community's understanding of storm processes.

The launch service contract for the TROPICS mission is a firm fixed-price contract valued at $7.95 million. NASA's Launch Services Program at the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida will manage the launch service.

The CubeSats, each the size of a shoebox, will provide rapid-refresh microwave measurements that can be used to determine temperature, pressure, and humidity inside hurricanes as they form and evolve. The TROPICS mission's high-revisit imaging and sounding observations are enabled by microwave technology developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lincoln Laboratory. These observations will profoundly improve scientists' understanding of processes driving high-impact storms.

Astra Space will launch the CubeSats on the company's Rocket 3 from Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands with three separate launches over a 120-day period. The TROPICS mission is targeted for launch between Jan. 8 and July 31, 2022, under a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) launch license.

ЦитироватьNASA заключило с Astra Space контракт на оказание пусковых услуг
Космическое ведомство США решило доверить Astra Space Inc. Выведение шести спутниковой группировки кубсатов Constellation of SmallSats (TROPICS). Контракт заключен по твердой фиксированной цене в размере $7.95 млн. Место пусков – атолл Кваджалейн на Маршалловых островах. Особенностью контракта является то, что он предусматривает выведение тремя отдельными пусками в течении 120 дневного периода.
После запуска кубсаты будут проводить микроволновые измерения, которые должны будут помочь следить за ураганами, сообщает Ecoruspace.
А.Ж.

Цитата: pignus от 29.08.2021 09:46:08Чтобы ракета сразу со стартового стола полетела не вврех, а в бок, оставаясь на той же высоте, такого еще ни когда не было. Но самое интересное, она не упала, а как ни в чем не бывало продолжила полёт дальше.
Как тебе такое, Илон Маск? :)

Цитата: azvoz от 29.08.2021 11:20:0628 августа 2021 года в 22:35 UTC Astra запустила свою четвертую РН Rocket 3, ракета 3.3 (LV0006).

Цитата: cross-track от 29.08.2021 09:59:56

Цитата: pignus от 29.08.2021 09:46:08Чтобы ракета сразу со стартового стола полетела не вврех, а в бок, оставаясь на той же высоте, такого еще ни когда не было. Но самое интересное, она не упала, а как ни в чем не бывало продолжила полёт дальше.
Как тебе такое, Илон Маск? :)

После выключения двигателей и перед закруткой что-то начало отрываться

(https://d.radikal.ru/d13/2108/cc/02d7e265c5ee.png)

Цитата: azvoz от 29.08.2021 11:26:18

Цитата: azvoz от 29.08.2021 11:20:0628 августа 2021 года в 22:35 UTC Astra запустила свою четвертую РН Rocket 3, ракета 3.3 (LV0006).

Полет осуществлялся с полезной нагрузкой  Космических сил Соединенных Штатов в рамках Программы космических испытаний,и отделение полезной нагрузки от ракеты-носителя не планировалось.
Вскоре после взлета из-за отказа одного двигателя РН сместилась горизонтально на несколько десятков метров в сторону от стартовой площадки, прежде чем подняться вертикально.
Транспортное средство отклонилось от своей разрешенной траектории, и служба безопасности полета завершила полет примерно в 2:28.
Ракета достигла максимальной высоты 50 км, прежде чем врезаться в океан , что привело к полной потере ракеты - носителя и ее полезной нагрузки.
В результате этого инцидента не было зарегистрировано никаких травм или ущерба имуществу.

Цитата: pignus от 29.08.2021 09:46:08Чтобы ракета сразу со стартового стола полетела не вврех, а в бок, оставаясь на той же высоте, такого еще ни когда не было. Но самое интересное, она не упала, а как ни в чем не бывало продолжила полёт дальше.
Как тебе такое, Илон Маск? :)

Цитата: Quit от 30.08.2021 01:30:37Этот запуск, безусловно, - победитель в соревновании «Веселые старты» этого года. Мы давно так не смеялись всей семьей за завтраком. Будем ждать следующего запуска с нетерпением.

Цитата: cross-track от 30.08.2021 09:01:41

Цитата: Quit от 30.08.2021 01:30:37Этот запуск, безусловно, - победитель в соревновании «Веселые старты» этого года. Мы давно так не смеялись всей семьей за завтраком. Будем ждать следующего запуска с нетерпением.

СУ ракеты парировала возмущение от невключения пятого двигателя, и увела ракету от пусковой установки. Хорошо отработала СУ!

Цитата: triage от 30.08.2021 17:50:22

Цитата: cross-track от 30.08.2021 09:01:41

Цитата: Quit от 30.08.2021 01:30:37Этот запуск, безусловно, - победитель в соревновании «Веселые старты» этого года. Мы давно так не смеялись всей семьей за завтраком. Будем ждать следующего запуска с нетерпением.

СУ ракеты парировала возмущение от невключения пятого двигателя, и увела ракету от пусковой установки. Хорошо отработала СУ!

было ли такое поведение при отказе одного двигателя заложено разработчиками? что при отказе ракета не проваливается, а зависает.

Цитата: Чебурашка от 30.08.2021 19:16:37Интересно, а если у "Ангары" один из пяти двигателей сразу выключится - также будет дрифтовать по Архангельской области.  ;D

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 30.08.2021 19:12:30

Цитата: triage от 30.08.2021 17:50:22

Цитата: cross-track от 30.08.2021 09:01:41

Цитата: Quit от 30.08.2021 01:30:37Этот запуск, безусловно, - победитель в соревновании «Веселые старты» этого года. Мы давно так не смеялись всей семьей за завтраком. Будем ждать следующего запуска с нетерпением.

СУ ракеты парировала возмущение от невключения пятого двигателя, и увела ракету от пусковой установки. Хорошо отработала СУ!

было ли такое поведение при отказе одного двигателя заложено разработчиками? что при отказе ракета не проваливается, а зависает.

Скорее всего. "Боковой снос" - результат парирования отказавшего ЖРД оставшемися четырьмя. Также скорее всего, была введена блокировка аварийного прекращения полёта вблизи старта.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 30.08.2021 19:25:52

Цитата: Чебурашка от 30.08.2021 19:16:37Интересно, а если у "Ангары" один из пяти двигателей сразу выключится - также будет дрифтовать по Архангельской области.  ;D

В пределах космодрома ;-).
Кстати, видеозапись старта Астры даёт основание полагать, что стартовая тяговооружённость ракеты около 1,25.

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 20:41:49И что потом с этими балластом делать?

Цитата: triage от 30.08.2021 21:08:04

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 20:41:49И что потом с этими балластом делать?

переливать в другие УРМы

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 20:41:49

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 30.08.2021 19:25:52

Цитата: Чебурашка от 30.08.2021 19:16:37Интересно, а если у "Ангары" один из пяти двигателей сразу выключится - также будет дрифтовать по Архангельской области.  ;D

В пределах космодрома ;-).
Кстати, видеозапись старта Астры даёт основание полагать, что стартовая тяговооружённость ракеты около 1,25.

А узлы крепления УРМа к центральному блоку сдюжают нагрузку в ~150 тс (и это в начале, далее нагрузка будет увеличиваться) в "противоестественном" направлении ::)
И что потом с этими балластом делать?

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 20:41:49А узлы крепления УРМа к центральному блоку сдюжают нагрузку в ~150 тс (и это в начале, далее нагрузка будет увеличиваться) в "противоестественном" направлении ::)

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 30.08.2021 22:45:56

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 20:41:49А узлы крепления УРМа к центральному блоку сдюжают нагрузку в ~150 тс (и это в начале, далее нагрузка будет увеличиваться) в "противоестественном" направлении ::)

А кстати, самая большая нагрузка "не в ту сторону" (-m*g*Nx) будет при старте. Потом будет уменьшаться, и в конце АУТ-1 будет примерно 50 тс.

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 23:24:10

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 30.08.2021 22:45:56

Цитата: strapel от 30.08.2021 20:41:49А узлы крепления УРМа к центральному блоку сдюжают нагрузку в ~150 тс (и это в начале, далее нагрузка будет увеличиваться) в "противоестественном" направлении ::)

А кстати, самая большая нагрузка "не в ту сторону" (-m*g*Nx) будет при старте. Потом будет уменьшаться, и в конце АУТ-1 будет примерно 50 тс.

Я, все-же, склонен полагать, что после отрыва от стола УРМ будет "толкать" в узлы крепления с силой ~ 50 тс, но если  :( АВД :( то станет "тянуть" "не в ту сторону" с силой ~150 тс (вики пишет, что у Ангары-А5 тяговооруженность ~1.27,  т.е. после АВД одного УРМа - чуть больше 1(для "увести и уронить в поле" вполне достаточно), т.е. -m*g*(чуть больше 1)). Не силен в конструкциях ракет - выдержат ли крепления?

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 30.08.2021 19:25:52

Цитата: Чебурашка от 30.08.2021 19:16:37Интересно, а если у "Ангары" один из пяти двигателей сразу выключится - также будет дрифтовать по Архангельской области.  ;D

В пределах космодрома ;-).
Кстати, видеозапись старта Астры даёт основание полагать, что стартовая тяговооружённость ракеты около 1,25.

Цитата: Верный Союзник с Окинавы от 31.08.2021 09:52:28А почему 1,25?
МБ там ещё движкам не удалось выйти на расчётный режим.

ЦитироватьAstra и Firefly Aerospace заключили сделку по продаже ракетных двигателей

Компания Astra, недавно вышедшая на биржу, заключила сделку на сумму около $30 млн на право производства ракетных двигателей Reaver компании Firefly Aerospace, согласно документу, полученному The Verge и людьми, знакомыми с соглашением. Соглашение является частью растущей тенденции консолидации в отрасли ракет малой грузоподъёмности, где компании заключают новые сделки, чтобы оставаться конкурентоспособными, поскольку частный капитал растёт и всё больше игроков выходят на поле, а спрос на услуги малых запусков меняется.
По условиям сделки, которая была заключена в начале этого года, Firefly отправит до 50 своих ракетных двигателей Reaver на завод Astra в Аламеде, штат Калифорния, куда в конце весны уже был доставлен один двигатель для разработки за примерно полмиллиона долларов, согласно внутреннему документу Firefly, просмотренному The Verge и человеком, осведомлённым о соглашении. «Инженеры Astra разбирают двигатель для детального осмотра», – сказал человек, знакомый с условиями, который, как и другие участники сделки, отказался говорить об этом официально из-за строгого соглашения о неразглашении.
Вице-президент Astra по коммуникациям Кати Дам отказалась обсуждать соглашение, когда The Verge попросили её прокомментировать конкретные детали, но назвала неверным количество двигателей, на которые распространяется сделка, а также стоимость примерно в полмиллиона долларов за первоначальный двигатель для разработки, находящийся на заводе Astra. Дам отказался предоставить какую-либо дополнительную информацию в подтверждение этих споров.

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Первая из серии трёх итераций ракеты Astra взлетает в сентябре 2020 года с космодрома компании в Кодьяке, штат Аляска. Фото: Джон Краус / Astra
Двигатели Firefly совместно с собственной ракетной технологией Astra помогут второй достичь заявленной публично цели "500 кг – 500 км", то есть возможности отправлять спутники весом 1 102 фунта [~500 кг] на самую популярную высоту орбиты для мега-созвездий. Нынешняя ракета компании, именуемая просто Rocket, была запущена в тестовом режиме в различных итерациях, но после трёх основных попыток так и не достигла орбиты. В последних итерациях ракеты используются пять собственных двигателей компании Delphin, которые рассчитаны на подъём до 331 фунта [~150 кг] на низкую околоземную орбиту.
Astra – один из немногих новых стартапов, проходящих через все испытания, связанных с запуском бизнеса. Спустя примерно пять лет после своего основания в 2016 году компания достигла космоса – но не орбиты – во время второго запуска в прошлом году, что произошло быстрее, чем обычно у большинства ракетных стартапов. Третья и последняя попытка, предпринятая в августе с площадки в Кодьяке, штат Аляска, закончилась неудачей после того, как один из пяти основных двигателей отключился почти через секунду после старта, как сообщил журналистам основатель Astra Крис Кемп.
Компания Firefly также испытывает трудности с выходом на орбиту ракеты Alpha, оснащённой четырьмя двигателями Reaver. В этом месяце первая попытка компании осуществить орбитальный запуск потерпела неудачу, так как один из двигателей Alpha заглох после самопроизвольного закрытия топливного клапана, лишив ракету возможности вертикального управления. В середине полёта она начала вращаться и разворачиваться в сторону, пока представители Космических сил, которые помогают управлять безопасностью запуска, не вмешались и не использовали систему экстренного подрыва ракеты. Alpha способна доставить на орбиту гораздо больше полезной нагрузки, чем ракета компании Astra – около 2 204 фунтов [~1000 кг] спутников на низкую околоземную орбиту.

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Ракета Alpha компании Firefly поднимается в воздух во время первой попытки запуска в сентябре 2021 года. Через две минуты после старта двигатель внезапно отключился, в результате чего ракета была остановлена, не достигнув космоса. Фото: Firefly Aerospace
Соглашение об интеллектуальной собственности включает пункт, который направлен на то, чтобы ракета Astra не конкурировала напрямую с ракетой Alpha компании Firefly. По словам людей, вовлечённых в сделку, Astra ограничена в использовании не более двух двигателей Reaver на ракету, что является достаточным для достижения цели "500 кг – 500 км". Кемп, основатель Astra, отказался комментировать специфику сделки, но подчеркнул, что Astra не покупает двигатели у Firefly. Это было бы серьёзным разворотом для бренда Astra – вертикальной интеграции, или схемы, в которой компания в основном владеет большей частью своей цепочки поставок для поддержания низких затрат и минимизации производственных рисков. Скорее, по словам людей, осведомлённых о сделке, Astra покупает интеллектуальную собственность двигателя, чтобы производить его собственными силами и не зависеть от поставщика двигателей, которые инженеры считают самым важным элементом оборудования ракеты.
«Я не могу комментировать какие-либо соглашения с поставщиками, которые у нас есть, но могу сказать, что мы заявили, что вся интеллектуальная собственность, необходимая для производства всех наших технологий, будет принадлежать Astra, лицензирована Astra или разработана Astra», – сказал Кемп в интервью The Verge.
Представитель Firefly отказался от комментариев.
Шаг Firefly по продаже интеллектуальной собственности на двигатели конкурирующей компании Astra является частью более широкой стратегии по диверсификации своего ракетного бизнеса и всё более распространённой тактикой в отрасли. В августе компания Firefly объявила о создании «нового направления бизнеса, посвящённого поставкам ракетных двигателей и других компонентов для космических полётов в развивающуюся индустрию нового космоса». Не называя имени Astra, основатель Firefly Том Маркусик сообщил SpaceNews в прошлом месяце, что Firefly заключила контракт на поставку около 50 ракетных двигателей компании, разрабатывающей собственную ракету-носитель. В документе Firefly, изученном The Verge, говорится то же самое, и добавляется, что обмен интеллектуальной собственностью является частью сделки. Несколько источников, участвующих в соглашении и знакомых с ним, сообщили The Verge, что Astra является нераскрытым заказчиком.
Поменять двигатели Delphin компании Astra на двигатели Reaver компании Firefly не так просто, как может показаться. Существование сделки между двумя компаниями предполагает, что Astra планирует перепроектировать ракету-носитель, которая, по мнению аналитиков, в любом случае была бы необходима для достижения цели по отправке 500 кг на низкую околоземную орбиту. Однако неясно, какую ракету Astra планирует создать на основе двигателей Reaver и когда она будет готова к запуску.

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Astra проводит испытания двигателя Delphin на своём предприятии в Аламеде, Калифорния. Фото: Джон Краус / Astra
Firefly предложила Astra напрямую продавать двигатели Reaver в начале этого года, – сказали люди, знакомые с ходом переговоров, – но Astra, сосредоточенная на внедрении новых технологий, производственные линии которых она может контролировать самостоятельно, не согласилась на такое предложение. «Мы не хотели бы оказаться в таком положении, когда из-за отсутствия поставки двигателя, мы не сможем запустить ракету», – сказал человек, знакомый со стратегией Astra. Это может быть правильным шагом, как показывает другой пример индустрии – United Launch Alliance (ULA), совместное предприятие Boeing-Lockheed Martin, покупает двигатели у Blue Origin Джеффа Безоса для ракеты следующего поколения Vulcan. Однако задержки в разработке двигателей Blue Origin задержали сроки первого запуска Vulcan.
«В целом, соглашение между Astra и Firefly выглядит как естественный результат растущей зрелости новых участников рынка», – говорит Карисса Кристенсен, отраслевой аналитик и основатель BryceTech. Индустрия малых запусков наполнена новыми участниками – в настоящее время существует около 100 различных компаний, осуществляющих малые запуски, и лишь немногие из них добились значительного прогресса в космосе. Rocket Lab, калифорнийская компания, которая запускает ракеты из Новой Зеландии, является единственной малой пусковой компанией, которая проводит текущие операции, используя свою ракету Electron для запуска спутников в космос для Космических сил и частных компаний. В этом году компания Rocket Lab вышла на биржу через слияние со SPAC, или специализированную компанию по приобретению, которая вышла на биржу только для того, чтобы объединиться с частной компанией и вывести её на биржу. Это позволило получить новый капитал для будущих планов компании по разработке ракет и оценить её стоимость примерно в $4 млрд.
«Исторически сложилось так, что космические компании сотрудничают и работают вместе, а также конкурируют, – сказал Кристенсен, – отчасти потому, что пусковые компании требуют больших инвестиций и не приносят постоянного дохода или прибыли». И «из-за относительно ограниченного спроса» не существует десятков тысяч запусков в год, которые обеспечивали бы занятость и доход. Вместо этого в год осуществляется около сотни запусков.
Как и компания Firefly, Rocket Lab в последние месяцы также занялась производством компонентов, но в других масштабах. Компания объявила о продаже реактивных колёс – крошечных компонентов, которые помогают спутникам сохранять положение на орбите – и планирует производить до 2 000 штук в год. «Продажа интеллектуальной собственности для таких двигателей, как Astra и Firefly, – прокомментировал основатель Rocket Lab Питер Бек, – не двигает иглу» [ред.: не производит большого эффекта] в индустрии малых запусков. «Предоставление тысяч реактивных колёс для большого количества платформ и крупных группировок – вот, что действительно двигает иглу для всей отрасли», – утверждает он.

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9-й запуск ракеты Electron для миссии "As The Crow Flies" компании Rocket Lab в 2019 году с полуострова Махиа, Новая Зеландия. Фото: Сэм Томс и Саймон Моффатт / Rocket Lab
Что касается небольших начинающих компаний, то «либо они выйдут из бизнеса, либо, я думаю, произойдут слияния и поглощения», – сказала Кристенсен. «Некоторые из этих слияний и поглощений, – добавила она, – будут результатом удобной сделки, достигнутой двумя компаниями, или отчаянной тактикой компании, чтобы остаться в живых. Это бизнес с высоким риском».
Компания Astra, основанная в 2016 году, стала первой стартап-компанией, которая вышла на биржу в начале этого года, получив доступ к новому капиталу путём слияния со SPAC. Astra была оценена в $2.1 млрд. После объявления о выходе на биржу компания приобрела Apollo Fusion в июле за $145 млн, забрав технологию электрических двигателей для космических аппаратов, предназначенную для питания космических платформ [ред.: это общая унифицированная модель для построения космических аппаратов, которая включает в себя все служебные системы спутника, а также конструкцию модуля полезной нагрузки, но без целевой аппаратуры], которые Astra планирует разработать.
Компания Firefly, основанная Маркусиком в 2014 году как Firefly Space Systems, прекратила свою деятельность в 2016 году после выхода европейского инвестора, что, по словам Маркусика, было связано с референдумом Brexit. Компания была возрождена под названием Firefly Aerospace в 2017 году, когда инвестиционная Noosphere Ventures, основанная украинским предпринимателем Максом Поляковым, купила активы обанкротившейся компании. После раунда финансирования, проведённого в мае, общая оценка компании составляет чуть более $1 млрд.
«Мы вывели Firefly из банкротства до оценки в более чем $1 млрд менее чем за 5 лет. Мы можем увеличить этот показатель в 10 раз в течение следующих 5 лет», – сказал Поляков в электронном письме The Verge.
«Если отбросить сумасшедших и романтиков, некоторые из этих компаний обладают солидными технологиями; другие могут иметь лучший доступ к капиталу. Неизбежным результатом такой ситуации на рынке является консолидация или слияние, – сказал он об общем ландшафте отрасли. – Немногие смогут выжить в одиночку».
Источник: TheVerge (https://vk.com/away.php?to=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theverge.com%2F2021%2F9%2F21%2F22670063%2Fastra-firefly-reaver-rocket-engine-ip-agreement&cc_key=)
Автор перевода: Алиса Зарипова (https://vk.com/aliceinwonderspace)

Цитата: undefinedWe have begun preparations for a static fire test in Kodiak. Our launch window has shifted to November 8th through 14th. Stay tuned for updates.

Цитата: designer от 05.11.2021 08:50:43Интересно, смогут ли они успешный запуск произвести?

Цитата: ZOOR от 05.11.2021 10:26:19Никто не встречал нормальной картинки с конструкцией?
У меня впечатление, что баки первой ступени с совмещенным днищем.
А вот что они в такой гигантский гаргрот натолкали, интересно?

Цитата: ZOOR от 05.11.2021 10:26:19Никто не встречал нормальной картинки с конструкцией?
У меня впечатление, что баки первой ступени с совмещенным днищем.
А вот что они в такой гигантский гаргрот натолкали, интересно?

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

Цитата: Quetzalcoatl от 20.11.2021 10:39:30Сегодня Astra провела успешный запуск Rocket 3.3 LV 0007 с острова Кадьяк. ГВМ достиг высоты 496 км на скорости 7613 км/с. Это достижение и заявка.  ;D

Цитата: Чебурашка от 20.11.2021 14:01:59NORAD подтвердил

Цитата: undefined49494/2021-108A now tracked in 438 x 507 km x 86.0 deg. orbit.

Цитата: Quit от 30.08.2021 01:30:37Этот запуск, безусловно, - победитель в соревновании «Веселые старты» этого года. Мы давно так не смеялись всей семьей за завтраком. Будем ждать следующего запуска с нетерпением.

Цитата: Чебурашка от 20.11.2021 14:29:43Посмотрел трансляцию, что-то к них первая ступень аж до 4 км/c разгоняется.
Вторая ступень, получается, сильно недоразмерена?

Цитата: undefinedWe experienced an issue in today's flight. I'm deeply sorry we were not able to deliver our customer's payloads. I'm with the team looking at data, and we will provide more info as soon as we can.

Цитата: Alex-DX от 11.02.2022 12:41:08.Astra.JPG

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 15:07:45

Цитата: Alex-DX от 11.02.2022 12:41:08.Astra.JPG

https://spacelin.ru/proekty/sverkhlegkaya-raketa-taymyr/

Цитата: Alex-DX от 11.02.2022 12:27:53Хорошая ракета, мне нравится.
Вторая ступень вообще уменьшенная копия Н-1. :)

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 18:28:19https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rosen-a-top-ranked-law-firm-files-securities-class-action-lawsuit-against-astra-space-inc-fka-holicity-inc-encourages-investors-with-losses-over-100k-to-secure-counsel--astr-hol-301479350.html

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.11.2021 15:31:40

Цитата: Чебурашка от 20.11.2021 14:29:43Посмотрел трансляцию, что-то к них первая ступень аж до 4 км/c разгоняется.
Вторая ступень, получается, сильно недоразмерена?

При непрерывном выведении на ССО примерно так и должно быть. Для РН СЛК в таком случае оптимальное соотношение тяг в районе 40 к 1 или около того, поэтому маленькая вторая ступень получается.

Цитата: ZOOR от 11.02.2022 20:33:48

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.11.2021 15:31:40

Цитата: Чебурашка от 20.11.2021 14:29:43Посмотрел трансляцию, что-то к них первая ступень аж до 4 км/c разгоняется.
Вторая ступень, получается, сильно недоразмерена?

При непрерывном выведении на ССО примерно так и должно быть. Для РН СЛК в таком случае оптимальное соотношение тяг в районе 40 к 1 или около того, поэтому маленькая вторая ступень получается.

А сколько теоретически теряется в Мпг по сравнению с выведением с апогейным импульсом?

Цитата: ratcustorb от 11.02.2022 20:42:40Есть расчёт для А-1.2:

Цитата: ZOOR от 11.02.2022 20:33:48

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 20.11.2021 15:31:40

Цитата: Чебурашка от 20.11.2021 14:29:43Посмотрел трансляцию, что-то к них первая ступень аж до 4 км/c разгоняется.
Вторая ступень, получается, сильно недоразмерена?

При непрерывном выведении на ССО примерно так и должно быть. Для РН СЛК в таком случае оптимальное соотношение тяг в районе 40 к 1 или около того, поэтому маленькая вторая ступень получается.

А сколько теоретически теряется в Мпг по сравнению с выведением с апогейным импульсом?

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 21:11:41Для кислород-керосиновой РН СЛК стартовой массой около 50 т при одинаковом наборе ЖРД на 1-й и 2-1й ступени (67 и 7 тс) повторное включение даёт выигрыш в 2 раза.

ЗЫ. На ССО-500

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 22:22:08

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 21:11:41Для кислород-керосиновой РН СЛК стартовой массой около 50 т при одинаковом наборе ЖРД на 1-й и 2-1й ступени (67 и 7 тс) повторное включение даёт выигрыш в 2 раза.

ЗЫ. На ССО-500

Но при другизх условиях картина может быть далеко не столь радужной.

Цитата: ZOOR от 12.02.2022 05:07:30Тут хочется понять, какой выигрыш дает второе включение

Цитата: ZOOR от 12.02.2022 05:07:30

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 22:22:08

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 11.02.2022 21:11:41Для кислород-керосиновой РН СЛК стартовой массой около 50 т при одинаковом наборе ЖРД на 1-й и 2-1й ступени (67 и 7 тс) повторное включение даёт выигрыш в 2 раза.

ЗЫ. На ССО-500

Но при другизх условиях картина может быть далеко не столь радужной.

Одинаковый набор ЖРД некорректен ИМХО

Тут хочется понять, какой выигрыш дает второе включение при одинаковой стартовой массе и одинаковом УИ ДУ.
То есть насколько обоснованы заморочки со вторым включением.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 12.02.2022 09:07:11Для ССО -500 выигрыш в этом случае невелик - считаные проценты для РН СЛК. Например, для метаной РН СЛК стартовой массой 15 т:
- прямое выведение 228 кг
- с повторным включением 233 кг.

Цитата: Плейшнер от 12.02.2022 09:29:21

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 12.02.2022 09:07:11Для ССО -500 выигрыш в этом случае невелик - считаные проценты для РН СЛК. Например, для метаной РН СЛК стартовой массой 15 т:
- прямое выведение 228 кг
- с повторным включением 233 кг.

Дмитрий, а для ССО-800 какие числа получаются?

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 12.02.2022 13:40:06В этом случае преимущество повторного запуска ожидаемо растёт: 205 против 178 кг при лучшем значении максимальных перегрузок: 8 против 12. 

Цитата: ratcustorb от 12.02.2022 14:34:04А какие допустимые максимальные перегрузки для КА?

Цитата: undefinedAstra engineers identified two problems — an electrical design issue and a software glitch — that prevented a rocket from reaching orbit last month with a suite of NASA-sponsored CubeSats, clearing the way for a return-to-flight mission that could launch from Alaska this week.
The company's next mission is ready to lift off from Pacific Spaceport Complex on Kodiak Island, Alaska, with several small commercial payloads heading into a polar orbit.
A launch attempt Monday was scrubbed due to bad weather at the Alaska launch site. The mission has a 29-minute launch window Tuesday opening at 12:22 p.m. EDT (1622 GMT; 8:22 a.m. AKDT).

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 13.05.2022 16:30:07Перспективная РН Rocket 4.0: https://astra.com/launch-services/ (https://astra.com/launch-services/)

Цитата: C-300-2 от 18.05.2022 09:38:51На первой ступени Рокит-4.0 указана тяга 70000 либрафорс и видно, что стоит два двигателя. Тогда тяга одного двигателя 155,7 кН. У Ривера* тяга по открытым данным 158 кН. Так што... Вот по двигуну второй ступени пока непонятки. Указана тяга "более 2000 либрафорс", т. е. 8,9 кН. Это существенно меньше, чем у Lightning 1 (70 кН) Фаерфлая, но больше, чем у двигателя первой ступени Рокет-3.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 18.05.2022 17:26:05Для второй ступени возможны варианты: напрмер 2 форсированных Aether (или 3 нефорссированных) или один высотный Дельфин. У земного Дельфина, кстати, тяга на уровне моря 6500 фунт-сила (2,95 тс).

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 18.05.2022 17:26:05У земного Дельфина, кстати, тяга на уровне моря 6500 фунт-сила (2,95 тс).

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 18.05.2022 17:26:05напрмер 2 форсированных Aether (или 3 нефорссированных)

Цитата: C-300-2 от 18.05.2022 21:20:02

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 18.05.2022 17:26:05Для второй ступени возможны варианты: напрмер 2 форсированных Aether (или 3 нефорссированных) или один высотный Дельфин. У земного Дельфина, кстати, тяга на уровне моря 6500 фунт-сила (2,95 тс).

А!.. мУдро, мУдро. Я-то протормозил и из-за инерции мЫшления думал, что там только один двигун.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 18.05.2022 17:26:05У земного Дельфина, кстати, тяга на уровне моря 6500 фунт-сила (2,95 тс).

Тогда тяга вакуумной версии этого же двигателя будет на 20% выше (чисто по моему опыту - исходя из статистики): 3.54 тс. Тогда два Дельфина дадут 7 тс или 70 кН. Много :(

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 18.05.2022 17:26:05напрмер 2 форсированных Aether (или 3 нефорссированных)

Тяга Аезэра 2,96 кН. Если сделать три - то да, вполне, вполне... 8,88 кН, что чуть менее 8,9 кН с ихнего сайта.

ЦитироватьКомпания Astra заявила, что больше не будет осуществлять запуски на ракете Astra Rocket 3.3,
так как перейдёт к Launch System 2.0 (Rocket 4) с вдвое большей грузоподъёмностью - 600 кг на НОО.

NASA готовы дождаться её введения в эксплуатацию для запуска предстоящих миссий TROPICS.

Расследование причин аварийного запуска TROPICS-1 всё ещё продолжается. До конца года новых запусков Astra не планируется.

ЦитироватьПроизводитель ракет-носителей компания Astra Space
 получил предупреждение об исключении из листинга от Nasdaq.
Это произошло после того, как акции компании 30 дней подряд опускались ниже 1 долл. за акцию.

ЦитироватьTask order valued at $11.45 million for a launch of an ESPA-class space vehicle and additional cubesats through the Orbital Services Program (OSP-4) contract

ALAMEDA, Calif. – April 21, 2023 – Astra Space, Inc. ("Astra")(Nasdaq: ASTR) announced today that it has been awarded a launch task order for Rocket 4 through the United States Space Force's Orbital Services Program (OSP)-4 contract.

"The Space Force deliberately structured the OSP-4 contract to leverage emerging launch solutions for mission partners like the DoD Space Test Program," said Lt. Col. Justin Beltz, chief of Space Systems Command's Small Launch and Targets Division. "Today's award reflects the tremendous promise industry is bringing to the table with systems like Rocket 4. We look forward to working with Astra to make this launch a success."

The STP-S29B mission is a Category 2 Mission Assurance launch, which will entail substantial efforts from Astra in tandem with the Government team and its independent mission assurance contractors to support a mission designed for success.

Цитата: Димитър от 06.07.2023 20:19:24Когда лететь собираются?

ЦитироватьAstra заявляет, что уволила 25% своего персонала и перераспределила другой персонал с запуска на двигательную установку космического корабля. Компания заявляет, что отложит работу над своей ракетой-носителем Rocket 4. Astra также прогнозирует, что оставшиеся денежные средства будут ниже предыдущих прогнозов. https://t.co/yhJ09mvkyV (https://t.co/yhJ09mvkyV)
— Джефф Фуст (@jeff_foust) 4 августа 2023 г. (https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1687576109221822465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)

ЦитироватьРынок нано- и микролончеров продолжает коллапсировать?

Цитата: Димитър от 06.08.2023 10:10:03в мире было более 100 проектов легких и сверхлегких космических ракет

Цитата: Димитър от 06.08.2023 10:10:0390 % из этих проектов должны были обанкротиться. Что и наблюдаем.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 06.08.2023 14:12:48Возможно, что в этом сегменте вообще нереально создать жизнеспособный прибыльный бизнес.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 06.08.2023 14:12:48Интересно то, что с рынка уходят те, кто на него, вроде бы, уже прорвался (Вёрджин Орбит, Астра).

Цитата: Дем от 09.08.2023 12:36:09И если для исправления надо начинать делать всё заново...

Цитата: Дем от 09.08.2023 12:36:09

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 06.08.2023 14:12:48Интересно то, что с рынка уходят те, кто на него, вроде бы, уже прорвался (Вёрджин Орбит, Астра).

Ну учитывая их историю запусков - нельзя сказать что прорвались. Железо да, сделали и запустили - но оно как-то не особо полетело.
И если для исправления надо начинать делать всё заново...

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 09.08.2023 19:29:53Индивидуальный запуск микро-спутников, вероятно, по-прежнему будет нишевым сегментом пускового рынка на западе, самым нищебродским.

Цитата: ZOOR от 09.08.2023 21:01:53

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 09.08.2023 19:29:53Индивидуальный запуск микро-спутников, вероятно, по-прежнему будет нишевым сегментом пускового рынка на западе, самым нищебродским.

А вдруг проведут рекламную компанию и вдолбят миллионерам , что собственный наносат  запущенный на днюху -- это круто?

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 10.08.2023 13:22:58Миллионры не дураки и запустят свои наносаты на Ф9 по услуге "Райдшаре" по $5500 за кило.

Цитата: mik73 от 10.08.2023 14:29:10

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 10.08.2023 13:22:58Миллионры не дураки и запустят свои наносаты на Ф9 по услуге "Райдшаре" по $5500 за кило.

а вдруг ему (миллионеру) не на ту орбиту понадобится, куда маршрутка (rideshare)  сегодня едет?
электрон-то в этой области вполне успешно окопался. есть ли в ней (области) еще место - вопрос, конечно, конический.

Цитата: mik73 от 10.08.2023 14:29:10

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 10.08.2023 13:22:58Миллионры не дураки и запустят свои наносаты на Ф9 по услуге "Райдшаре" по $5500 за кило.

а вдруг ему (миллионеру) не на ту орбиту понадобится, куда маршрутка (rideshare)  сегодня едет?
электрон-то в этой области вполне успешно окопался. есть ли в ней (области) еще место - вопрос, конечно, конический.

Цитата: Дмитрий В. от 10.08.2023 15:48:35Для наносатов выбор орбит невелик - либо на любую, либо на ССО. На ССО Ф9 летает минимум 3 раза в год.

Цитата: mik73 от 10.08.2023 14:29:10а вдруг ему (миллионеру) не на ту орбиту понадобится, куда маршрутка (rideshare)  сегодня едет?

ЦитироватьSpaceNews  @SpaceNews_Inc
Astra agrees to go private https://spacenews.com/astra-agrees-to-go-private/
(https://img.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/356340.jpg)

ЦитироватьWASHINGTON — Spacecraft propulsion and launch company Astra Space has accepted a proposal from its founders to take the company private after previously warning its only other alternative was bankruptcy.
The company announced March 7 that it accepted a revised proposal made by Chris Kemp and Adam London, chief executive and chief technology officer respectively, on Feb. 24 to take the company private at $0.50 per share. That price was just one third of what the two originally offered in a November 2023 proposal to take the company private at $1.50 per share...

Цитата: zandr от 08.03.2024 12:14:43Astra Space has accepted a proposal from its founders to take the company private after previously warning its only other alternative was bankruptcy.