Firefly’s Alpha rocket has reached orbit for the first time

The Alpha rocket reached its intended altitude after it was launched from California. Firefly stated that the launch was the first company to launch and reach orbit from US soil in only its second attempt.

FireflyAerospace develops launch systems for commercial customers. The first Alpha test flight exploded mid-flight. Three previous launches for Alpha 2 were aborted in September due to technical issues and poor weather.

There were three aborted launches in September.

FireFly's Alpha vehicle is capable of launching a 745 kilogram (1,642 pound) payload to a 500 km (310 miles) Sun-synchronous orbit. The PicoBus, the largest of the three small satellites on board the Firefly Alpha 2 flight, weighed in at just under 14 pounds. The world's first fully free and open-sourced telecommunications constellation will be tested by PicoBus.

NASA's TechEdSat-15, a three-unit cubeSat carrying experiments for TechEdSat's Nano-Orbital Workshop, and the educational cube satellite created by Teachers in Space were included in the extra payloads. The launch of Alpha 3 will take place on November 29th of 2022.

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