People near the Mojave Desert may have caught a strange sight Wednesday morning: A 70-foot rocket plummeting from the sky
It's was part of a pre-planned test carried out by Virgin Orbit, the space startup backed by British entrepreneur Richard Branson. The company wants to fire satellites into orbit using rockets that launch mid-air from under the wing of a plane. Wednesday's spectacle, during which a Virgin Orbit LauncherOne rocket was intentionally left to freefall back to the ground for a"drop test," was the final step toward reaching that goal.
The big business of smallsatsThe company says its LauncherOne rocket will be able to thrust 500 kilograms, or 1,100 pounds, into orbit — enough lift capacity for a batch of small satellites, or smallsats.As satellite technology has grown cheaper, the demand for less expensive and more frequent rocket launches has swelled. Numerous startups are trying to answer that demand by building cheap, lightweight rockets that will be dedicated to launching miniature satellites.
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