An orbital rocket launched from a Norwegian spaceport, the first launch of its kind from European soil, crashed seconds after lift-off on Sunday.
The German start-up company that built the rocket, Isar Aerospace, headquartered in Ottobrunn, southeast of Munich, still hailed the test flight a success.
It said the test flight made the company the first commercial space firm “to launch an orbital rocket from Continental Europe.”
The Spectrum rocket crashed into the sea some thirty seconds into its first test, but the company insisted the aim of the first flight was to gather as much data as possible.
An orbital launch vehicle is a rocket-propelled vehicle, used to deliver a payload, like satellites, from our planet into the Earth’s orbit, or to other planets.
Launch from Norway’s Andoya Spaceport
Liftoff took place at 12:30 p.m. (1030 GMT/UTC) from Norway’s Andoya Spaceport after which Isar Aerospace said the launch vehicle “successfully cleared the launch pad.”
The rocket the “was terminated at T+30 seconds and fell directly into the sea in a controlled manner,” the company said.
“Our first test flight met all our expectations, achieving a great success,” Daniel Metzler, CEO and Co-founder of Isar Aerospace said in a stament posted on the company website.
“We demonstrated that we can not only design and build but also launch rockets,” Metzler said, adding that the foundation had been laid “to cater to the rising global demand for flexible satellite launch services.”
The Spectrum launch vehicle is 28 metres long and has a diameter of 2 metres and is capable of carrying a payload of between 700 and 1,000 kilograms to space, depending on orbit.
Isar Aerospace was founded in 2018 and is a possible European answer to Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin.
Europe’s space quest
Europe has some way to go when it comes to space travel, lagging behind the likes of the US, China and India.
German news agency dpa cited managing director of the German Aerospace Industries Association Marie-Christine von Hahn, as saying that the launch was a groundbreaking step for German space travel.
“This test of a highly complex rocket manufactured in Germany has yielded an enormous amount of data that will enable us to make further progress,” she said.
Von Hahn called for more financial support for the European space industry to safeguard competitiveness and independence and emphasized the need for alternatives to Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite constellation.
Edited by: Roshni Majumdar
