Rocket Lab makes first booster catch attempt during successful There And Back Again mission

by Anthony Iemole

After announcing plans to recover and reuse the first stage of the company’s Electron rocket back in 2019, the California-based rocket company has attempted a mid-air recovery for the very first time. After a successful mid-air catch, the recovery helicopter pilot noticed different load characteristics than expected, and released the stage so it could softly splash down for an ocean recovery.

The “There and Back Again” mission launched at 22:49 UTC on May 2, delivering 34 payloads to a sun-synchronous orbit of 520km. The mission was originally scheduled to launch on April 19 but was repeatedly delayed to wait for favorable weather for the experimental recovery attempt.

The Mission

The “There and Back Again” mission is launched from Rocket Lab‘s Launch Complex 1A, located on the Māhia Peninsula in New Zealand.

The private launch complex supports two launch pads, LC-1A and LC-1B, and allows Rocket Lab the ability to increase its launch cadence from the same site.

A third launch pad, Launch Complex 2 (LC-2), is located in the United States at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) on Wallops Island, Virginia. LC-2 has yet to host an Electron launch, with its debut mission expected to be an Electron carrying a satellite for HawkEye 360 currently targeting December 2022.

This was the 26th Electron launch overall and the third of 2022. The mission comes after the previous mission, “Without Mission a Beat,” launched on April 2 and delivered two BlackSky high-resolution Gen-2 satellites to low Earth orbit (LEO).

Electron booster during launch preparations. Credit: Rocket Lab.

Electron is a two-stage liquid-fueled launcher that was designed and manufactured in-house by Rocket Lab with the goal of serving the small satellite launch market.

The vehicle is 18 meters (59ft) tall, 1.2 meters (~4ft) wide and is made primarily of carbon fiber composite.

The first stage is powered by nine Rutherford engines and runs off RP-1 kerosene and liquid oxygen (LOX). The Rutherford engine uses an electric pump-fed cycle and is also the first rocket engine of its kind to be used on an orbital launch vehicle.
The second stage also uses a vacuum-optimized Rutherford.

Electron also features the ability to carry a kick stage. The kick stage is powered by the Curie engine, named after physicist and chemist Marie Curie, and is also developed and manufactured in-house by the company.

Once placed into an elliptical orbit around the Earth, the kick stage separates from the second stage and enters a coast period. After coast, the kick stage fires up its engine to circularize its orbit ahead of payload deployment.

The kick stage allows very precise orbital insertion and supports the ability to relight multiple times. This allows multiple payloads to be placed into slightly different orbits depending on a customer’s needs.

For this mission, the kick stage made one burn to circularize its orbit, with ignition at T+57 minutes, 43 seconds, and cutoff at T+ 59 minutes, 11 seconds.  All payload deployments occurred shortly after engine shutdown.

There were 34 payloads in total on this mission coming from six different companies, bringing the total number of satellites launched by Rocket Lab to 146.

Four payloads come from Alba Orbital and consist of four pico-satellites. Pico-satellites are generally referred to as satellites that mass less than 1kg.

Three of the satellites were built by the company My Radar, with two being named TRSI-2 and 3, joining the TRSI-1 satellite which was launched into orbit onboard the “Running out of Fingers” mission back in 2019. The third payload is known as MyRadar-1.

Another payload is Alba Orbital’s own satellite dubbed Unicorn-2 which carries an optical night-time imaging payload designed to monitor light pollution across the globe.

One payload comes from Astrix Astronautics and will deploy the company’s “Copia” system. This system aims to improve the power restraints of small satellites.

The next payload is the AuroraSat-1, from Aurora Propulsion Technologies. The satellite is a 1.5U CubeSat and will demonstrate space junk removal technologies for small satellites. AuroraSat-1 will also test its deployable Plasma Brakes which combine a micro-tether with charged particles in space, or ionospheric plasma, to generate significant amounts of drag to deorbit the spacecraft safely at the end of its life.

Three payloads come from the company E-Space and consist of three demonstration satellites for the company’s sustainable satellite system. At the end of their operational lives, the satellites will attempt to capture any small debris before actively de-orbiting themselves in an attempt to reduce the amount of debris in orbit.

Another payload launching on this mission is the BRO-6 satellite. This will be the sixth satellite in the constellation run by the company UNSEENLABS and will improve the constellations’ ability to detect radio frequency signals. This gives the company the ability to detect vessels at sea, even when the vessel’s cooperative beacon is turned off.

The final payloads launching on the “There and Back Again” mission are two stacks of SpaceBEE CubeSats. SpaceBEE’s are 0.25-1U CubeSats built and operated by the private company Swarm Technologies. With these satellites, the company currently operates a low bandwidth satellite internet constellation for use with IoT (Internet-of-Things) devices.

Booster Recovery

Back in 2019, Rocket Lab Founder and CEO Peter Beck announced plans to make the company’s Electron rocket partially reusable.

Unlike SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets — which land propulsively either on one of the company’s three autonomous drone ships, or if mission performance requirements allow, back on land at Landing Zone 1&2 in Cape Canaveral, or Landing Zone 4 at Vandenberg AFB in California — Rocket Lab intends to catch the first stage of Electron via helicopter while descending under parachute.

This was not the first booster recovery attempt made by the company; however, it was the first time the company tried to catch the booster while it descended under parachute.

During Electron’s 16th mission named “Return to Sender”, the booster deployed its parachute, successfully splashed down in the ocean, and was able to be recovered.  The mission demonstrated that an Electron booster could survive reentry and successfully control its descent while under parachute and no catch attempt was planned.

Two additional booster recoveries were also conducted using the same method and allowed Rocket Lab to gain more data on how well Electron survives reentry and what improvements can be made to future vehicles.

One such improvement is the addition of a new, very thin thermal protection system designed to help shield the stage from the heat of re-entry. The coating now gives the stage a shinier metallic look as opposed to Electron’s more iconic all sleek black look.

This first catch attempt also comes after many mid-air recovery tests were done using a test article that simulates electrons’ first stage.

For this catch attempt, the company utilized a new member of its fleet, a customized Sikorsky S-92 helicopter.
About an hour prior to lift off, the helicopter moved into position in the recovery zone about 150 nautical miles off the coast of New Zealand.

After re-entering the atmosphere, and about seven minutes after liftoff, the booster deployed a drogue chute at around 13km (8.3 miles), followed by the main parachute at ~6km (3.7 miles).

Just over eight minutes after liftoff, the main chute slowed the vehicle down to ~10 meters per second (~22 mph).
About 18 minutes after liftoff the helicopter flew just above the booster and snagged its parachute with a hook.

The hook is designed to collapse the parachute and secure the vehicle for transport back to land. It was shortly after a successful catch that the stage was dropped in order to ensure the safety of the helicopter and its pilot.

After the stage is recovered after its soft splashdown, Rocket Lab engineers will then be able to inspect the booster and analyze its suitability for another flight. Being able to inspect flown hardware gives engineers a better opportunity to help improve future vehicles.

It is unknown whether Rocket Lab plans to re-fly this booster if it ends up in good condition, or if it will be used as a pathfinder for future reusable vehicles.

(Lead image: Electron’s first stage under parachute as seen by the recovery helicopter. Credit: Rocket Lab)

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