Rocket Lab The Rocket Lab launched a small spacecraft to the moon from its New Zealand facility early Tuesday, a mission that represents firsts for both the company and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The company’s Electron rocket carried a special edition of the Photon satellite platform, which carries a 55-pound microwave-sized spacecraft called the CAPSTONE. “Perfect electron launch!” Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck tweeted on Tuesday. CAPSTONE, an acronym for “Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment”, is a low-cost mission representing the first launch under NASA’s Artemis lunar program. At a cost of just $ 30 million, NASA hopes the mission will verify that a particular type of moon orbit is suitable for the Moon’s Gateway space station, which the organization plans to launch later this decade. The success of the Gateway does not depend on this data, Christopher Baker of NASA, executive of the small spacecraft technology program, explained to CNBC before the launch. But, he added, CAPSTONE allows the organization to ground its orbital calculations “in real data” and give “operational experience to Halo’s nearly straight orbit”. Currently orbiting the Earth, Photon will then launch its engine several times in the coming days, before sending the CAPSTONE spacecraft into an orbit that will take about four months to reach the moon. Once there, CAPSTONE will remain in orbit around the moon for at least six months to collect data. The CAPSTONE spacecraft was placed on top of the company’s Photon lunar spacecraft. Rocket Lab CAPSTONE also represents the first Rocket Lab mission to go into “deep space” – surpassing the company’s typical low-Earth target. NASA turned to a small group of companies to carry out CAPSTONE. In addition to Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket and Photon spacecraft, Colorado-based Advanced Space has developed and will operate CAPSTONE, while two California companies built the small spacecraft and provided its propulsion system – Terran Orbital and Stellar Exploration, respectively. . “Every key element here actually comes from a company that for the past 10 years has received a small business award from the government to develop the technology used for this mission,” said NASA’s Baker. “We are very interested in how we can support and leverage US trade opportunities to promote what it is capable of – and one of the things we have really been pushing for all these years has been how we are expanding our reach. small spacecraft orbiting low Earth in new challenging destinations, “Baker added.
