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After years of wading through a tangle of regulatory issues, Virgin Orbit says it’s finally ready to fly its LauncherOne rocket from the UK.
If all goes well, the modified Boeing 747-400 Cosmic girl The plane will take off Monday evening from a Cornish spaceport, with a launch opportunity at 5:16 p.m. ET (22:16 UTC) over the Atlantic Ocean. Destined for low Earth orbit, this “Start Me Up” mission will carry satellites from seven customers in both the United States and the United Kingdom.
The air launch mission has received significant attention in the United Kingdom as it is advertised as the country’s first-ever orbital launch. In fact, it will be the first launch of an orbital satellite from the UK or Western Europe. However, it will not be a vertical launch from British soil. Spaceports capable of carrying out such launches are under construction at various locations around the country, but probably won’t be ready for an orbital launch this year. And unlike British launch companies that want to use those spaceports, Virgin Orbit’s technology was developed, built and tested in the United States.
This hasn’t lessened the fervor of Cornish horizontal launch spaceport proponents.
“I feel confident and I feel focused and I feel ready to take on anything that comes our way,” said Melissa Thorpe, head of Spaceport Cornwall, at a press conference with reporters on Sunday. “I’m so excited. Audiences can’t wait for the UK to join that exclusive launch club because it’s going to feel good.”
Thorpe is part of a team that has been working for eight years to bring a horizontal launch capability to Spaceport Cornwall, located on the site of Newquay Airport, a former Royal Air Force station. During that time, officials from the spaceport, the UK Space Agency and Virgin Orbit have been working to address regulatory concerns related to handling the missile in Cornwall and launching it across international waters to the southwest of Ireland.
Virgin Orbit had hoped to launch the mission in late 2022, but ongoing paperwork issues eventually pushed the mission to early 2023. Due to these delays, Virgin Orbit only managed to launch its LauncherOne rocket twice in 2022.
“We knew this wasn’t going to be a piece of cake when we jumped at this opportunity,” said Dan Hart, CEO of Virgin Orbit, of getting a UK launch license.
Officials at Sunday’s press conference expressed hope that this launch will be the first of a regular cadence of Virgin Orbit missions from the United Kingdom.
“We’re excited to be here today,” Hart said. “We are excited about the future and may be back later this year to relaunch and hopefully get a rhythm going. We want to be part of the fabric of the space community here in the UK and globally. That is our aim as a company, and I think there’s a big opportunity.”
However, it’s not clear how much of the infrastructure was flown to Spaceport Cornwall for the Cosmic girl aircraft and LauncherOne’s refueling operations remain on site after this mission. Virgin Orbit is also unlikely to fly another mission from the UK in the next 12 months, if not significantly longer.
