Spaceflight and Virgin Orbit today
announced they have signed a Memorandum of
Understanding (MoU) for a mission to Low Earth
Orbit (LEO) in 2019.
Virgin Orbit’s Cosmic Girl, a dedicated 747-400
carrier aircraft, will carry LauncherOne (which will
house Spaceflight’s customer smallsats) to an
altitude of approximately 35,000 feet before release
for its rocket-powered flight to orbit. The
two-stage expendable rocket, which is currently in
the final stages of qualification, can place about
300-500 kilograms into orbit. Virgin Orbit aims to
conduct multiple missions to LEO in 2018.
Spaceflight has launched more than 140 satellites to
date from a variety of launch vehicles including
Falcon 9, PSLV, Dnepr, Antares, and Soyuz. It
recently announced agreements for launches on
Electron, Vega, and now LauncherOne.
“We’re continuing to provide the most options for
customers to get their spacecraft into orbits that
traditional rideshare cannot service,” said Curt
Blake, president of Spaceflight. “LauncherOne offers
timely and targeted access to the equator and
mid-latitudes, and we’re excited to provide this
innovative service to our customers via this
partnership with Virgin Orbit.”
Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart added: “Spaceflight brings
a proven track record of launch success, a vibrant
international customer base, and a customer-centric
approach to put together missions to LEO, GTO, GEO
and beyond. This agreement further propels the
smallsat revolution and gets us closer to realizing
our vision of launching anyone, anywhere, any time.”