The ultra-light carrier Rocket of the American company Astra, positioned as potentially the cheapest rocket in the world for launching a small payload into space, has reached near-Earth orbit for the first time. The corresponding video was posted on Twitter by the editor NASASpaceFlight.com By Chris Bergin.
The rocket was launched on November 20 at 09:04 Moscow time from the Kodiak launch complex in Alaska. According to NASASpaceFlight.com during the mission, the upper stage of the rocket with the payload layout inseparable from it were placed into a near-Earth orbit with a height of 500 kilometers. The launch was the fourth and first successful for Astra.
In the future, the American startup plans to launch spacecraft in the interests of NASA and the US Space Forces, as well as Planet Labs and Spire Global companies.
In December 2020, the Rocket carrier for the first time overcame the Pocket line (100 kilometers above sea level), which is considered a conditional boundary between the Earth's atmosphere and outer space. The rocket reached an altitude of 390 kilometers and reached a speed of 7.2 kilometers per second, which is about 0.5 kilometers per second less than the speed required to enter Earth orbit. At that time, Astra stated that the test launch was considered successful, since it allowed determining the exact ratio of fuel components (kerosene and liquid oxygen) for future launches.
In September of the same year, the Rocket launch ended with a fall with a coup and an explosion. As Astra noted, the problems were related to the rocket's navigation system, as a result of which it was decided to stop the engines of the first stage.
The American Astra is working on a one-time Rocket carrier, which, according to the company, should become the simplest and most technologically advanced rocket in the world, and therefore the cheapest. Astra is confident that this task will be solved when the reliability of the carrier launches reaches 95 percent at a launch price of about one million dollars. Currently, the cost of launching a Rocket, designed to remove about 150 kilograms, is estimated at $ 2.5 million. Rocket development, like the creation of the SpaceX Falcon 9, is distinguished by an iterative approach.
Ivan Potapov
