WELLINGTON: Aerospace company Rocket Lab said yesterday it had successfully fired a rocket into orbit for the first time from its New Zealand launch base.
“Electron is orbital. Successful payload deployment,” the company tweeted.
The Electron rocket, named “Still Testing”, took off from Mahia, on the east coast of the North Island, at 2.45pm yesterday and reached orbit eight minutes later.
The 17-metre-long carbon-fibre rocket is carrying three satellites into space – one to take images of Earth for United States company Planet Labs, and two to capture weather and ship tracking data for Spire Global.
“Speechless. Just like that, #rocketlab reaches orbit and sets a new bar for launch by reaching orbit on just their 2nd test,” satellite-powered data company Spire tweeted. — AFP