Featured Image: Brady Kenniston/Rocket Lab
Liftoff Time/Launch Window | April 23, 2024 – 22:00 UTC | 10:00 NZT |
|---|---|
Mission Name | Beginning Of The Swarm |
Launch Provider | Rocket Lab |
Customer | Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and NASA |
Rocket | Electron |
Launch Location | LC-1, Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand |
Payload mass | Unspecified |
Where are the satellites going? | Two destinations: 520 km and 1000 km circular orbits |
Will they be attempting to recover the first stage? | No |
Where will the first stage land? | It wil crash into the Pacific Ocean |
Will they be attempting to recover the fairings? | No |
Are these fairings new? | Yes |
How’s the weather looking? | TBD |
This will be the: | – 4th Electron launch from New Zealand of 2024 – 5th Electron launch of 2024 – 47th Electron launch – 77th orbital launch attempt of 2024 |
Where to watch | Official livestream |
What’s This All Mean?
For the fifth time this year, Rocket Lab will loft small satellites into space using it’s small but mighty Electron rocket. This is only the fourth Electron launch from New Zealand because of Rocket Labs previous mission from the Wallops called, Live and Let Fly (NROL-123). Utilizing the Curie kick stage, an upper stage satellite platform built by Rocket Lab, one payload will be delivered to a 520 km circular orbit and the other, after a quick boost, to a 1000 km circular orbit. The two payloads are NEONSat-1, an Earth observation satellite for the Satellite Technology Research Center (SaTReC) at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), and NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System (ACS3). For more information, visit the press kit here.
